


Cursed Promises

by Iomhar



Series: Alternate Universe Hunger Games [7]
Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games (Movies)
Genre: Altered Mental States, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Disordered Eating, District 1 (Hunger Games), Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Hunger Games worldbuilding, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Original Character(s), Past Child Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rape/Non-con Elements, Victory Tour (Hunger Games), Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-23
Packaged: 2021-03-17 22:53:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 49
Words: 60,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28607814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iomhar/pseuds/Iomhar
Summary: As a Career, she was told that victory was the ultimate goal.  But what happens when the things she's done have destroyed her, and now she must go on a Victory Tour to celebrate a lifestyle based on blood and lies?A look into personal relationships and the different districts of Panem during the Victory Tour.  And possibly a bit of murder.This is part of my alternate universe Hunger Games series.  There is no set reading order.
Series: Alternate Universe Hunger Games [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1886524
Comments: 159
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Cursed Promises takes place during the Victory Tour following the 146th Hunger Games. It is written as a stand-alone story, but the characters were previously featured in “A Collision of Past and Future.” No knowledge of the previous story is needed, but if you prefer not to have spoilers, it is recommended that you read it first. Otherwise, feel free to read this as its own entity.
> 
> This is the story of a girl who went to the Hunger Games at fifteen years old, set a record for the number of tributes killed, and joined her two older sisters in victory. She has suffered immensely, both from a harsh Career life and from the events within the arena, and has been in and out of the hospital for psychiatric issues in the months that followed. Please be advised that this story will discuss mental health topics in detail. The author has done moderate research but is not an expert by any means and has taken some creative license with this. Some of said topics are included in the tags to make the readers aware, but the author wishes to convey that the purpose is not to define the main character by any label or to illustrate any one specific mental disorder. The main character’s mental issues stem from a variety of problems, including child abuse and her time in the arena, which will be discussed in this story. Additionally, the main character can often seem blunt, crude, or dismissive about the things with which she is suffering. The author wishes to say that what the character says/does is not necessarily representative of what the author believes is appropriate or healthy.
> 
> That aside, I hope you enjoy this story. It’s a bit of a different one for me since I normally focus on the Hunger Games themselves.

**_The Capitol_ **

The doctor recommended I start writing to express myself, but I know that everything I write is subject to be read by the Capitol so I have encoded it to make it more difficult to follow. That’s clever of me, isn’t it, Isabella? Nobody doubts that I’m clever, that’s the thing. But I do. I’m not sure much about me anymore, not after learning that my past is a lie and the future is built on the people I’ve killed. Where do I go from here?

It’s been six months since I won the Hunger Games. I, Avalon Vitner, achieved my life goals at fifteen years of age. I broke several records: no other family has ever had three victorious children; no other family has had four victors in total; no other victor has ever killed nine tributes. I follow my grandmother, Dawn Hildebrand of the 83rd Hunger Games; my eldest sister, Europa Vitner of the 142nd Hunger Games; and my older sister, Isabella Vitner of the 143rd Hunger Games. We are a family with great love for the Hunger Games, and I am proud to have followed in their footsteps.

Right now, I should be in my victor mansion enjoying the well-earned lavish lifestyle of a new victor. But instead I’ve spent the last six months in and out of the hospital, and I can’t wait to be out of here again. Everybody says that I’m traumatized because of Mom and Dad’s brutal deaths shortly after my victory, but that’s pretty silly, isn’t it, when I was the one who killed them? Dr. Castillo is nice enough, and she doesn’t pretend that it was their deaths that drove me to madness. Nor does she think I’m a complete freak for what I’ve done. Weird. We talk about things. Oh, you know: how we were raised, going to the Hunger Games, killing a whole bunch of people, then returning home only to kill a couple more. Did you know that starving your kid isn’t a normal thing for parents to do, even for Careers? Or that expecting your children to forget about their dead brother and go on with life is not healthy? Geeze, all these things you learn a little too late.

Anyhow, this isn’t supposed to be me reminiscing and stuff. See, Isabella, I was inspired to write in this notebook like how you wrote in a notebook while I was in the arena. Only now I’m about to go on the Victory Tour—well _we_ are, since you and Europa are going, too—and I figured that if the doctor wants me to express myself, there’s no better time than now. I don’t know if you’ll ever end up reading this because it’s not like you can actually understand this code I’m writing in, but it makes so much more sense to write _to_ someone. Why would I write to myself?

I’m kind of excited for the Victory Tour despite what you and Europa have warned me about. This will be the longest time that I have been away from the hospital, and it’s not like they can send me back when I’m supposed to be out representing the Hunger Games. Unless I really screw things up, but that’s why I have you guys, right? Anyhow, I’m going to be on my best behavior. I can’t wait to see all the districts, even if it’s only a fleeting glimpse from the inside of a train.

So I guess this my account of the Victory Tour and all that happens. Obviously I only want good things to happen, but who am I kidding? I just killed a bunch of kids and now I get to go celebrate their deaths. No big deal there.

This is a short entry today because it’s my first day writing and my hand hurts. I promise the future ones will be better.


	2. Chapter 2

**_The Train en route to District 12_ **

When I was younger, I used to dream about the Victory Tour. Not in my sleep, but while I was awake. I was never allowed to go with my sisters, so I only had my own imagination to supplement what they had told me, and as I ran my ten miles in the morning I’d fall into daydreams to keep me company. Sometimes I’d pretend that I was with Europa or you, Isabella, and sometimes I’d be on my own. After all the hard work I put into training, I never once thought that I wouldn’t be victorious.

This morning, the prep team came and got me all ready for the cameras. My stylist, Blue-Anna, has switched positions so that she no longer works officially for the District 1 tributes but for my sisters and myself. Between the three of us, we’re pretty much a full-time job. I’ve lost count of the number of interviews and photoshoots we’ve had, each one requiring a new outfit. She’s always so kind to us, and she only creates outfits that flatter us, even if they’re too wild for my liking. Today we all wore her dresses, but the attention centered on me.

“You look beautiful,” Isabella said after Blue-Anna led me to a full-length mirror we keep covered up in the spare bedroom of our townhouse. (I hope you don’t mind that I’m switching from second person to third person when I refer to you, Isabella. I think that too much second person might bog down my writing.)

I stared back at my reflection in this black dress with the rabbit fur collar. Many days I had caught glimpses of myself in the mirror and wondered who the girl was who stared back at me. I remember what I used to look like: full cheeks, wide smile, hazel eyes, muscular body. They didn’t do much in the ways of manipulating me post-victory, except sometimes I wonder if the eyes they recolored are even mine. They stare back at me, glistening like emeralds with only subtle undertones of brown. You wouldn’t think that changing something so simple would alter my perception of myself, but it does. It’s me, but it’s not me. Then again, I think that’s how I would describe myself in general these days. Now I still have the same wide smile, but it’s harder to keep it in place without one half slipping down into an uneasy grin. I’ve lost the muscle tone since I don’t train anymore, and it’s weird seeing these little bits of fat where I used to be dominated by muscle. It’s not that I really _care_ , but again, it doesn’t quite seem like me.

Today, however, I found myself smiling at my reflection. The outfit flattered me like the others, but somehow it made me look like, well, _me_. For a split second, I thought I was back to how I was before, but then I remembered that girl doesn’t exist anymore and neither does the world in which she was birthed and nourished and formed because I destroyed it all.

“The Capitol is so lucky to have you as our victor,” Blue-Anna said. I glanced up to see her reflection in the mirror over my shoulder. Tears glistened in her eyes as she looked me over. Finally she let out a sigh and said, “Let’s not fall behind.”

With that, the Prep Team put their finishing touches on me, and then I waited while Europa and Isabella were helped into their dresses. Europa is twenty-two and Isabella is twenty. They’ve been victors long enough that they know how all this stuff goes, and they’re more than eager to make sure that I stay on track, too. The attention so far has been focused on me, but once I’m old news (pretty much after next Hunger Games when a new victor is determined), we’ll all three of us be equals. Although they smile at Blue-Anna and tell her how nice the dresses are, there’s a certain blandness to what they say, like they’ve been here a million times and now it’s just a formality. I chime in and tell them how pretty they look.

Once we are all ready to go, we’re ushered outside where cameras wait us.

Here’s the thing about most of us Careers: we were trained for victory. Not just to kick ass in the arena, but also how to handle the fame and spotlights. Mom and Dad even had us take speech lessons where we learned not just the art of public speaking but also how to hold ourselves and walk with proper posture and those sorts of things.

So as soon as I stepped outside and I saw the cameras, something clicked in my head and all apprehension vanished, leaving only barely-restrained excitement behind. This is what the Capitol wants to see, and I will give it to them. I held my head up with my shoulders back, and I smiled for the cameras. My sisters and I formed the perfect little trio as we paused for the cameras and told them how excited we were for the Victory Tour. Then they filmed us as we climbed into the car that would take us to the train station. It was a short segment, and it seems so silly to spend so much time dressing up for it considering that as soon as we got situated on the train, we switched out our dresses for more comfortable lounge attire.

We have the entire train to ourselves. Its entire purpose is to take the victor and his or her entourage around the country every year, and now it’s filled with an endless chain of cars. My sisters and I each have our own car, as do the other victors and the stylist and escort, and then there’s a separate car for hanging out, and another one for dining, and another one that has a pool table and other games. The best car is the dining car; I went there while I was waiting for the others to change out of their clothes and sneaked a few snacks in before anyone noticed. To my disappointment, we didn’t get a great selection of food for lunch and had to eat what they gave us. Like being back at the hospital again. Damn.

“Avalon, you need to practice your speech for District 12,” Europa said to me as we settled into the lounge car after lunch.

I pulled a face, but Europa kept her expression stern. I hate when she becomes all business and pretends like everything else in the world doesn’t exist. But when she reached out and handed me the notecards, I took them without complaint.

It was the usual stuff. How wonderful and generous everyone was. How the kids there died for honor and glory or whatever. Things that a Career might believe but I doubt that a non-Career would ever care about. It’s all bullshit anyhow; we just have to go through the motions. Following my sister’s instructions, I stood up and recited the information on the cards until I could speak clearly and flawlessly. She probably would have made me do it a hundred more times except at that moment, the scenery outside the window captured my full attention.

Flat land in all directions. Just as far as I could see. I shoved the cards back at Europa and bounded from one window to another to drink in the forever nothingness that flew by us. And I mean just really _flat_. No small hills to break up the endless stretches of white snow. I had seen it in pictures and in arenas, but to actually be here in the midst of all this drew my breath straight from my body.

“District 9,” Europa said as she watched me. “We’ll return here in a few days and you can see the strange, backwards place for yourself.”

“Backwards?” I asked as I pressed my palms to the window and fogged the glass with my breath.

Europa stood up and joined me at the window. She stared out at the sweeping fields and openness.

“You’ll see. Not everyone out here is as civilized as District 1,” she said.

I squinted into the distance in the hopes that I could see some sign of life out here. What did she mean by ‘backwards’?

This makes me wonder how different the districts really are from each other. I never thought about these districts doing anything other than producing grain or clothing or whatever in addition to the kids that I’d eventually kill. Back when I thought that killing was a glamorous thing and had no thoughts in my head besides success. Of course I know that District 1 is different from other districts, but to think that others can be described as being strange and backwards baffles me when they appeared to be normal at the reaping.

“If you were to come through here during the summer, it’s even more amazing,” she said to me. “These are all fields producing various grains.”

Would I be coming through here in the summer?

“You’ve seen it all,” I commented.

Europa shrugged. “Been on a few trains,” she said.

I supposed so. This is her third Victory Tour. Once for herself, once for Isabella, once for me. But those were all during the winter when the Capitol wants to remind people that the Hunger Games exist. When had Europa been here to see the lush grasslands?

“What do I do if no one wants to see me?” I asked suddenly. I press harder against the glass as though it could somehow absorb my confusion.

The Victory Tour should be an honor, but the more time that passed since my victory, the more uneasy and uncertain I felt. I had done what I had been bred to do, and now that it was over, there was nothing to replace the growing emptiness within me. We could fill it full of outings with my sisters and classes at the university, but those things did nothing to give me meaning. Where would I go now that I had served my life purpose? I had worked so hard to win the affection of Mom and Dad, and now they were gone and I didn’t even have the satisfaction of hearing them tell me how proud they were of me, not like they did for Europa. I worked so hard, I did everything I was supposed to do, I fought to earn my place as a victor, and—

And nothing.

Just nothing.

Like these great, empty fields void of life.

“Avalon, the people aren’t going to be happy to see you, not when they would have wanted their own tributes to be successful,” Europa said to me. “But they understand that you are their rightful victor and will respect you as such. The same way it would be in District 1 when other districts win.”

I hoped she was right. But she didn’t give me time to contemplate it before she pulled me away from the window to go over the index cards once more and give me pointers in how to make myself more endearing to the crowds whose children I had killed.


	3. Chapter 3

**_The Train en route to District 12_ **

Excitement within the train ran high as the prep teams once more prepared us for the cameras. In a few hours, we would be within the boundaries of District 12, and we had to pretend that we hadn’t spent the night on a train and were as fresh and enthusiastic as ever. I’d probably have been more enthusiastic if I got more than ten minutes to eat breakfast before I was dragged away to get started. Not sure why because it wasn’t like we’d be reaching the station in the immediate future.

Fortunately we were not required to wear dresses for this, but Blue-Anna put us in pants and sweaters and boots that were appropriate for the cold. We looked nice and probably out of place in our designer clothing, but at least it wasn’t _too_ out of place.

Mildred, the escort, followed me to the lounge car where we waited for my sisters. Once we were all assembled, the escort laid out the plan:

“When we get to District 12, you will be given a tour by car of the town and its surrounding areas,” she explained. I’m sure Europa and Isabella knew all this, but neither of them had anything to add. “Then we will reconvene here to get ready to go to the Justice Building where you will give your speech, and following that, we will have dinner hosted by the district officials. It will be a wonderful opportunity for you to appreciate District 12 culture.”

I’m sure that the residents of District 12 would be thrilled to have me there. Around that time, some of the other District 1 victors began to emerge from their cars: Isolde (135th), Hammer (134th), Jericho (122nd), Cronus (115th), and Luna (108th). Once Mildred found someone else to occupy her attention, Isabella leaned over and whispered to me, “When we take the tour, don’t say anything that could be interpreted as rude, okay? We’re meant to be representatives of our district.”

“Oh, you assume that I would say something rude?” I said with mock offense. Yeah, she’s probably right—I’m not always the best at refraining from tactless comments. They kind of just slip out of my mouth before I can stop them.

Isabella gave me a look, and I just smiled innocently right back at her. She fought to hold back a smile of her own, and just barely managed to keep her face straight.

“When’s lunch?” I asked.

Europa rolled her eyes. “You just ate breakfast,” she said.

“No, I didn’t,” I responded. “They had me get all made up and stuff, so I missed breakfast.”

“I saw you eating a muffin,” my oldest sister cut me off. “You’ll get lunch whenever the rest of us get lunch.”

Fine, fine. No arguing with Europa. I stared at her and she stared right back. No staring contests with Europa, either. I turned away and looked back out the window where the flat, open fields have long since been replaced by trees and hills and mountains. After a few minutes, Europa meandered away to talk with the other victors, leaving just Isabella and me.

“Isabella,” I said once I had worked up the strength to speak what was weighing down my mind. “How do you face the families of the tributes you’ve killed?”

“I’m probably not the best person to ask about this,” she replied. I turned away from the window to see her watching me with steady eyes. Only a few months ago—when I was in the arena—did she finally admit that she didn’t remember her Hunger Games because she blocked them out the moment she left the hospital. I imagine that going on a Victory Tour not knowing which tributes you killed and which ones you didn’t made the whole thing a bit of a different experience. She finally allowed the memories to come back; at first it was a flood of thoughts and feelings, but now that the gates have opened and the surge has waned, only a remaining few trickle in.

“It’s not like I can ask Europa,” I commented casually, crossing my arms over my chest. “She’ll just tell me that I look them in the eye and tell them to suck it.”

“She would not say that!” Isabella said with exasperation. She hesitated as though she were going to say more, but she left it at that. Here in the train, we aren’t given the ability to speak freely with each other, so it’s hard to discuss our varying levels of enthusiasm for the Hunger Games. I think Europa is finally coming around to seeing how terrible it is, but she can’t seem to _really_ see it, if that makes sense. She still takes pride in each of her kills and what she did to bring honor to the district, even if she also knows that it was somewhat pointless. Isabella, on the other hand, is much more reasonable; she realizes how messed up the entire affair is and how shitty it is that it’s picked apart our brains in different ways. But she can’t say that here on the train.

“Fine, maybe she wouldn’t say that, but you know that her style of handling these things is not the same as mine,” I told her. “So what am I supposed to do?”

She swept a strand of thick blond hair behind her ear and thought about my question for a moment.

“Europa went over how to read the cards, right?” she asked. “Just follow what she said. You won’t be interacting with most of the residents—it’s pretty much just the officials and maybe a couple of the victors if they’re available.”

Other victors. A surge of giddiness went through me at that thought. There were so many people who I’ve heard my sisters talk about over the years. A few of them I had met—obviously the ones in District 1 and there were some introductions at the victory party, but that was a blur—but since my victory, most had gone back to their home districts. It’s unusual for victors to stay in the Capitol year-round like my sisters and I do, but there are a couple of others. Isolde, from our district, and Cassiopeia from District 5 also attend the Capitol University. Not that we were in the same classes; I pretty much was in a bunch of remedial classes since I hadn’t finished high school, and they were in more advanced courses with Isabella.

Okay, I have to go now because it’s almost time to leave the train to go take our little tour of the district.

**_After the District 12 Tour_ **

Geeze, that’s depressing. I mean like really. It’s not _horrible_ but it’s like they’re doing whatever they can to impress us and it falls pretty short. I probably sound like a spoiled brat writing this, but they really ought to not try to win our affection and just be themselves or whatever because forcing themselves to our standards doesn’t really work. The buildings are clean, but old like they never thought that springing for a new chair to replace the ones from fifty years ago would be a worthwhile investment. The streets ought to be repaved, or at least patched up, because even with the thin sheet of snow on the ground, you can still feel the bumps as we hit rough asphalt. The entire time, however, they’re glossing over all this stuff and pretending like this little dump of a district has potential. It’s so dumb. Just admit that you’re putting your road repair money towards the nice juvenile detention center you’re trying to hide but is clearly brand new.

Alright, my stylist is hauling me away again to get me ready for the speech.


	4. Chapter 4

**_Evening in District 12_ **

This will be a long Tour. I don’t know how I’m going to get through it.

They took us to the Justice Building where we met the mayor of District 12 and some other officials. If I have to go through all twelve districts, I’m not going to bother writing down everybody’s names and descriptions and whatever else. I’ll spare my hand for the interesting things. Anyhow, they were polite and we were polite and everybody congratulated me and my sisters even though I could see the pained expressions that they didn’t bother pretending to cover. Then everyone scattered to take their places for the speech.

I clung to the note cards and waited behind the large doors of the Justice Building. On the other side, I could hear the rumble of the crowd waiting to see me. When the doors opened, we were ushered onto the stage. But the moment I stepped out, I felt like I was _there_ at the District 12 reaping. In that one brief moment, I was a kid in District 12 absolutely terrified because my name had been drawn and I would die. I scolded myself for thinking such things and kept my smile on my face as I stepped toward the microphone. My sisters remained behind at a polite distance. Despite the fact that they have been with me through it all, ultimately I am the victor and it is my duty, and mine alone, to make this speech.

So I put my lessons to good use, stood up straight, and gave my little speech. I had practiced it enough that I barely had to read the cards, though having them in my hand was a comfortable safety net should I falter. The families of the fallen tributes stood on pedestals in the audience with large images of their children behind them. The weird thing was that the male tribute was standing there with them. His pale face was somber, and deep circles surrounded his eyes. He wore the outfit from the arena, and as I spoke and looked him over, I noticed that there was a large wound in his chest where my weapon had stabbed into his body. Unnerving as it was, I kept my composure and recited the speech flawlessly. Before I knew it, the moment was over and my speech was finished. The crowd clapped politely, but of course their hearts weren’t in it. They were here because they were required to be here, and as Europa said, they were merely acknowledging me as the new victor.

“Good job,” Europa said to me when we were back within the walls of the Justice Building.

“You did great,” Isabella added.

“It wasn’t terrible,” I admitted. But secretly I wondered how the hell anyone expected me to get through eleven more of those. Mildred gave me no time to ponder it because I was brought to another room where Blue-Anna and the prep team members dressed me up for dinner in a formal gown. At this point, something uneasy began to seep into me, like a strange coldness that started at my navel and wound its way through the various nerves in my body. It wasn’t icy enough to freeze, but it left me uncomfortable for seemingly no apparent reason. I considered saying something to my sisters, but they had been taken elsewhere to get ready, and I was on my own.

Then Mildred led me to a dining room on the second floor of the Justice Building. Clearly they only used it for formal occasions because it was singlehandedly the only place in the entire district that was clean, polished, and modern. I met my sisters there, and we had to process in following Mildred’s careful guidance: prep team, then Mildred herself, then Blue-Anna, then my sisters, then me. A band played music for us, and everyone rose and cheered when I came in, but it was more of a formality than something done out of genuine excitement. Then there were introductions, and I was lead to a table and given a place of honor. I was placed between Europa and some District 12 government official whose name I forgot, and across from us were a few more District 12 important people. Phoenix, the victor of the 102nd Hunger Games, sat diagonal from me, and on the other side of him was Terra, who won the 129th Hunger Games. As excited as I was to meet them, the entire affair overwhelmed me, and I kept mostly to myself except when people asked me questions.

Dinner was served to us, and it was quite lovely. For what District 12 failed to impress in the tour, they made up for with this meal. I ate everything that they gave me, though Europa kept pinching me under the table as a reminder to pace myself.

“What do you think of District 12?” one of the important District 12 people asked me. Obviously he wanted me to say something flattering about the district, and I very nearly commented on the one impressive feature so far: the shiny new detention center. Fortunately I caught myself and gave him a few generic statements that made him smile in pride.

“That was a very wonderful speech,” another person said. She smiled at me.

I smiled back. “Thank you,” I said. I didn’t say that I didn’t write it, but I figured everyone knew that already. “It was a very nice ceremony. I loved all the flowers—are those native?”

“They certainly are,” the woman said. She went on to list the names and where one could find them in the district, and she proudly told me that they were only found in the wild and were never grown in captivity. Or however you grow flowers. Then she concluded by saying, “It was a great ceremony, and we in District 12 are proud to have you here before us.”

I smiled at her, but internally my brain was rolling around in my skull trying to figure out how to answer that when it was _very clear_ that nobody besides these people at the table were thrilled by my presence. And I’m sure that even those who were invited to this dinner were only happy because they were required to be happy. The faces of the families of the fallen tributes flickered vividly in my mind before disappearing again.

“One thing I don’t understand is how you made the male tribute so lifelike,” I commented.

The woman hesitated. “I beg your pardon?” she said uneasily.

I became aware that everyone was staring at me by now. Most had finished eating, or were just picking off the last bits of food, and other conversations had dwindled.

I swallowed hard and clarified, “On the platform with his family. . . . The District 12 male tribute looked really real.” I decided to leave off the part about the gaping wound in his chest.

People exchanged uncomfortable looks with each other, and I knew I had said something wrong. Perhaps I was supposed to ignore it, though I’m not sure how the hell I could pretend that he wasn’t there. Or his hologram, or whatever it was. I folded my hands in my lap and looked around the table, not quite meeting anyone else’s eyes—or perhaps they did not want to meet mine. At last I found Phoenix staring straight at me, his dark expression honed in directly on me.

At last the woman said, “Avalon, honey, there was no male tribute there on the platform. It was just his family.”

“Oh.” I sat up straight. “I thought I saw his hologram. . . . But maybe that was just one of his siblings, or a trick of the light.”

Nobody had a good response to this because now I knew just as well as anyone else that there had been no hologram, no identical sibling, no trick of the light.

“It was pretty bright with all the overhead lights,” Europa said at last. This seemed to release the tight grip my words had on the room, and everyone let out a collective breath and began murmuring that it was, indeed, very bright and from my position on the stage, it wouldn’t be so hard to mistake something else for what I had seen. I nodded in appreciation, but it was just a thin covering on a very bad situation. Although the conversation eventually turned to other things, I couldn’t escape the sensation that I had committed a grave error. . . . And even worse, that I had seen something that didn’t exist at all.

 _I’m crazy,_ I thought. _Like absolutely freaking crazy. They have NEVER shown any holograms of fallen tributes at Victory Tours, and I knew that. Why didn’t I just keep my mouth shut and ask Europa or Isabella later?_

As dinner wrapped up, a few people stood and gave speeches about how honored District 12 was to have me there, and how wonderful it was that I won. I pretended like I had said nothing at all about the ghost tribute and went along with the party as planned. Fortunately it ended, and Mildred said that it was time that we were getting back to the train because we had a schedule to keep. We bid everyone goodnight and were escorted to our train once again.

The moment it was socially acceptable for me to disappear to my room, I did. I flung my dress on the ground, threw on my night clothes, and crawled under the bed to write. I don’t know why; I guess I just feel more comfortable here, like somehow the thick mattress will protect me from the barrage of thoughts that assault me.

**_The Train en route to District 11_ **

Isabella came and visited me, but I had fallen asleep under the bed and apparently scared the crap out of her. Once she finally found me, the frustration on her features melted into sympathy and she encouraged me out from under the bed.

“Europa told me what happened,” she said gently as she sat down next to me on the mattress.

I clasped my notebook and pen in my hand and stared blankly at the wall ahead of me. I’m pretty sure ALL of Panem will know soon enough what happened.

“I’m crazy,” I whispered to my sister. “I-I saw the District 12 male tribute right there on stage with his family. He was . . . he was dead. Had a hole in his chest where I had stabbed him. Ugh, I’m so stupid—I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“You’re not stupid,” Isabella assured me. I noticed that she didn’t say anything about me not being crazy. No use trying to pretend like that isn’t true. “Being on the Victory Tour is really stressful. There’s a lot going on, and you get to see all sorts of new things. Plus everyone in the entire country is watching you. . . .”

“But I _wanted_ this,” I say. “Why would I be stressed because of the Victory Tour, of all things?”

Isabella shrugged. “You can enjoy something and have it be stressful at the same time,” she said. “Have you ever hallucinated before?”

Hallucinated. Now _that_ was a word that I never thought I’d hear said about me. I studied the notebook in my hands and didn’t answer at first as I scanned through my mind for any instance that might have been a hallucination.

“I don’t think so, but I also didn’t realize that what I was seeing today wasn’t real,” I say. “But I’ve never seen a dead tribute walking around, if that’s what you mean.”

We fall silent at that.

Isabella let me read her notebook in which she kept an account of what she went through during my Hunger Games, and in it she revealed many things that I’m sure I never would have guessed. I’ve mentioned here that she had forgotten her time in the arena, but she had also recorded her interactions with Cassiopeia, the District 5 victor of the 145th Hunger Games. Cassiopeia hears voices. And when she found out that Isabella had memory loss, she said that she was surprised that more victors weren’t messed up like this. Before I went to the arena, I never would have thought that the Hunger Games would have screwed with my head like this, and I find myself weirdly embarrassed about it. The only comfort I have is knowing that I am not alone in my insanity. Not that it’s much of a comfort when we victors are supposed to pretend like there’s nothing wrong with us at all.

That’s how the Capitol functions. We are representatives of its finest institution, so we cannot be damaged in any way. The fact that I have been hospitalized for psychiatric issues was pinned on the death of my parents because it would have been a fate worse than death to admit that it was the Hunger Games that destroyed my sanity. And now I find out that things are worse than I thought. . . .

How much longer will I be able to pretend?

“Don’t worry, Avalon, we’ll get through this,” Isabella assured me. “Now that we know that you’re prone to visual hallucinations, we’ll keep an eye on things. Don’t let this add any more stress to your trip.”

I’m not sure how it couldn’t add more stress, but I nodded and thanked her. She fell off into silence and I finally said, “I need to get to sleep.”

“Of course,” she said, turning to me with a smile. “Tomorrow we’ll be in District 11.”

She left, and I curled up in bed. Thoughts of District 11 tumbled through my mind. Like all districts, I had seen pictures in school and on television, but to actually be there is another thing entirely. Despite my apprehension, I felt a tingle of excitement, and I couldn’t sleep, so I decided to write instead. I think it’s time to put it down and get some rest.


	5. Chapter 5

**_The Train en route to District 11_ **

Fields and orchards lightly dusted with snow. That’s District 11 for you, at least during the winter. We saw a few cars driving along backroads, but they never stayed in our sight for long before they vanished far behind us.

I’m really hoping that District 11 won’t be as destitute as District 12. Not that District 12 was _the worst_ because from what I understand it used to be downright terrible a hundred years ago even, but it certainly wasn’t what I expected at any rate. The guide had bragged about their excellent schools and the economic growth of the district, but everything looked dismal and I wondered how someone could bother going to school when there was grime coating the window panes. I know that District 11 is often considered one of the poorer districts despite the wealth of food, so it wouldn’t surprise me if it was on the same page as District 12.

Europa came and talked with me today. She was much less . . . optimistic than Isabella.

“They’re going to be watching you very carefully from now on,” she said to me as we sat in my car and watched the world blur by.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything,” I replied. The idea that I’d now have even more eyes on me made me uneasy. It’s bad enough that I know I’ll be prone to these sorts of things, and now with the Capitol honing in on me waiting for me to mess up again, it’s even more pressure that I don’t know if I can bear.

Europa didn’t answer right away. She was probably thinking, _Yeah, duh, you shouldn’t have said anything._ But I suppose that it doesn’t matter now when what’s done is done. She let out a breath and turned to the window.

“I shouldn’t have encouraged Mom and Dad to send you to the Hunger Games,” she murmured.

“Can we not do this again?” I asked. “It’s not going to help anything.” I shifted uneasily in my seat. I had _wanted_ to go to the Hunger Games. Not this past year, definitely, but I figured that when I was eighteen, I’d be unstoppable and a shoe-in for victory. Never did I imagine that I’d do so well in the arena at fifteen. Nor did I imagine that my own parents would beat me when I objected to going. It’s funny how you think life will unfold in one manner and then the rug’s pulled out from underneath you and you have to keep your balance so you don’t fall on your face.

Europa nodded. “Fine,” she consented. “But you need to be extremely careful. If anything is out of the ordinary, don’t comment on it.”

I’ve grown so used to listening to Europa and doing everything she told me to do. For years, I looked up to her and wanted to be just like her; I’d follow any instruction she’d give me. Her specialty was heavy blunts, but despite this, she was well-versed in almost any weapon, and she knew all the tips and tricks and survival skills. When I had been chosen as volunteer, she worked out a meal schedule to ensure that I received the appropriate amount of nutrients during Prep Week. We came up with strategies together, and I followed them exactly as she directed.

But does she really know what she’s doing now? This isn’t the Hunger Games. It’s similar, but it’s so terribly different. I’m no longer fending off starvation or trying to kill other kids. This isn’t a temporary state that I will forge through. This is _life_. And Europa is prepared to use weaponry and assess physical threats and handle adoring fans. She has no idea how to deal with hallucinations or crazy little sisters or trying to stay sane during such a stressful time. When she went on her Victory Tour, it was a celebration of her success. And now this is . . . I don’t know. It’s a tomb. A collection of the dead.

The train slowed down and Europa’s eyebrows furrowed in concern. When she saw me staring at her, she forced her face to relax into its normal stern expression, but she wasn’t able to erase the uncertainty in her eyes as she tried to get a better view of outside.

“This is a small train station,” I commented as I looked at the little wooden platform exposed to the open air. And we were in the middle of nowhere. Beyond this station, I could see orchards of some sort, and in the distance something that looked like a massive greenhouse. Maybe we were stopping to refuel, but likely not; if this had been a routine stop, Europa wouldn’t have looked so concerned. My attention turned back to my sister.

“Probably nothing,” she stated when she noticed me staring at her. She waved her hand. “But let’s go over tonight’s speech.”

I hated that this was a back-to-back event. Which made me irritated because I _should_ be looking forward to this. The idea of stop after stop after stop to celebrate the Hunger Games was once something that I dreamed about. And now all I could think was that I couldn’t wait to be back on the train tonight. Still, I took the cards from Europa, stood up, and cleared my throat.

After twenty minutes, the train still hadn’t moved, and Europa kept throwing distracted glances out towards the platform. But no one had come or gone.

“Maybe we need repairs,” I said.

Europa turned back to me and nodded at the notecards. “Continue.”

So I did. But we were interrupted two minutes later when Isabella poked her head into the room. “Europa? Can I borrow you for a second?”

“Just Europa? What about me?” I demanded. “Don’t keep secrets from me!”

Isabella rolled her eyes. “I’m not,” she said. “But they want Europa because she’s your mentor.”

“You mean babysitter,” I grumbled, but Europa was already heading out the door with Isabella, leaving me with the notecards and a good look at the empty platform. No, not empty—there were a few Peacekeepers further down, but I could barely see them. I craned my neck to see what I could, but the stern men and women in their white uniforms told me very little.

When neither Europa nor Isabella returned for me, I slipped out into the hallway and tiptoed through the cars until I heard a bit of commotion. I lingered off to the side, and perhaps if anyone were to actually look around them, they’d see me standing there, but instead they were too engrossed in their conversation. Europa, Isabella, Mildred, and a short, fat man I’ve never seen before were exchanging whispered words, but they didn’t guard their speech carefully enough, and even out here on the fringes of the car, I could hear easily.

Europa: “I don’t think that’s necessary. We’ll handle things fine on our own.”

Man: “I don’t think you understand, my dear girl. This isn’t optional, nor is there any room for negotiation. What’s been decided has been decided.”

Europa: “We can send for—”

Man: “Not at all. It’ll only be a few minutes before he’s here.”

Mildred: “A few minutes?! We’re already nearly forty-five minutes behind schedule! They will miss the tour of the peach orchards!”

Man: (shooting her a look of annoyance) “I’m sure the girls won’t be too upset that—”

Mildred: “It’s not just the ‘girls’! The residents of District 11 take pride in their work, and we can’t be snubbing them with a delayed train!”

They went back and forth like this for awhile before the man finally gave in, at least to Mildred’s requests.

Man: “Seeing as waiting for Dr. Newell will delay this train further, I’ll give him orders to catch up with you in the station at the town square.”

Isabella: “What, exactly, does this doctor specialize in?”

Man: “Don’t you worry about it, young lady. He’ll see to it that your sister is taken care of and won’t draw any further attention to her . . . hmm . . . disposition.”

I shrank back and stepped through the door into the adjacent car. The train was being delayed so a doctor could catch up with us and I could be treated. I caught my breath and forced myself to steady my breathing. Of course the Capitol couldn’t risk me having another slip-up, so they found out a way to make sure that it didn’t happen again. And now instead of Dr. Castillo who has worked with several victors over the years and is generally well-trusted by those of us who are never eager to share our secrets with the Capitol, they have given me someone new. Someone who no doubt wants more to keep me under control than to actually help me.

At this point, there was nothing I could do, so I slipped back to my car and picked up the note cards. Perhaps if they could see that I am capable of handling myself, they’d realize that I didn’t need a doctor. After all, this tour is only a few weeks, and then I’d probably be admitted back to the Capitol hospital where my normal doctor would treat me.

The train started moving again, and I looked out the window as we pulled away from the platform and began to pick up speed. Once it had disappeared far behind us, the bedroom door opened and Europa stepped inside.

“How’s the practice going?” she asked as though nothing had happened at all.

I smiled at her to keep up the game. “I think I got it,” I said. “Do any victors ever write their own speeches? Not that I want to because who wants that sort of pressure, but this is all so convoluted and fancy. . . . I can pull it off, but what about the victors who clearly have never wanted the spotlight?”

“Every now and again victors write their own speeches, but they have to be approved first, and it’s a bit of a process,” she said. “Usually it’s just easier to read what they give us. That’s what I did, and what Isabella did.”

We fell into an easy chatter, neither of us speaking about a conversation that I wasn’t supposed to have overheard. I wondered if Europa planned on telling me about it, or if she was just going to let it play out on its own and I’d have to wait until I met this new doctor face-to-face.

Eventually Blue-Anna came and said that it was time to get ready. She had a gleam in her eye, and she said that she was eager for us to see our outfits for the orchard tour. I think she enjoys dressing us up and finds it something of a challenge to create outfits that are similar but not the same. My sisters and I all share the pale complexion and thick blond hair—there’s no denying that we’re related. It adds a level of excitement to not inadvertently make us look identical. Not that we are; our faces aren’t the same, and our eyes are no longer as close in color as they were, and we’re all different heights. I’m the shortest, but I’ve been told that I have some growing left to do. If I don’t grow, are they going to make me grow, like surgically?

Then we took our tour of the peach orchards, which was very nice and they gave us fresh peaches to eat. I ate mine and finished Isabella’s, and I would have eaten Europa’s, too—she wasn’t going to eat it—except she insisted that she was saving it for dessert. It was pleasant being in the bed of a truck, bouncing along down the dirt road, the cold air whipping through the hair that spilled out from underneath the thick wool hat Blue-Anna had given me.

Okay, I have to stop writing. I’m getting faster at this, but not fast enough because I can’t finish everything I wanted to say. But it’s time for the speech.


	6. Chapter 6

**_In Exile_ **

Do you remember, Isabella, the time that you once told the entire world about “our” memory, but it was really the memory you shared with Augustus, our dead brother? Do you remember when you showed up at the Training Center apartment with a big bruise on your face where Europa had punched you? She tried to pretend that it wasn’t a big deal, but it was. I think, maybe, it was a bigger deal for me than it was for you, if I can be so bold as to make that assumption.

Because I wanted that memory to be ours. I really, really, _really_ wanted to share the pirate adventure that you and Augustus had created together.

I used to be jealous of you and Augustus because I was always tagging along with you when I could, but then Mom and Dad put a stop to it. They said that I had to work on my training because the trainer said I had wonderful potential.

As an aside: I really, honestly cannot think about our old trainer with any sort of respect anymore. Not after knowing that Europa was forced to sleep with him. Which—ugh, I can’t believe I’m even admitting this—is really gross because I used to think he was hot. But I digress.

Mom and Dad wouldn’t let me play with you and Augustus. They never told me directly that they were disappointed in you, but I could read it pretty clearly, even as a kid. (I was taught to be observant, remember? It kind of backfired on them sometimes.) You and Augustus brought shame to the family because you had the NERVE to have fun sometimes. You didn’t spend every waking moment eating, breathing, dreaming about the Hunger Games. You had an imagination, and you weren’t ashamed of it. I wanted an imagination, too. No, I had an imagination, but I wasn’t allowed to use it. Because I had too much potential, and it couldn’t be wasted on childish games like you and Augustus played.

But okay, here’s the truth: I used to daydream for hours and hours and hours. I loved it and hated it. Almost all of my daydreams involved the Hunger Games for whatever reason, but every once in awhile, there was a joyous dream of pirates or adventure or other things that had no influence of the Hunger Games. But I was not allowed to dream those things for long because I knew I was being selfish for thinking them at all. Hadn’t our parents given up so much for us to be here? Hadn’t they spent good money on our trainer and all the weapons and equipment? Should I waste it by even _thinking_ things that were not helping me in my goal to win the Hunger Games?

They were surprised but not really that surprised when Augustus died. I remember hearing them talking about how much of a disappointment it was that their son had failed them. Yes, Isabella, they actually said that Augustus’ death was a failure. Those words actually came from their mouths. And they were worried about you, too, but they also said that his death would be good for you because it would help you focus, and you would know the consequences of failure. And I’m just like, “Yep, okay, that sounds good” because I was so young and dumb that I believed it. What was I, ten years old? I dried my tears on my sleeves and told myself that it was completely stupid to be sad about Augustus when it was his own fault that he was dead.

See, Dr. Castillo had a lot of work to do on me. Still does, especially given recent developments.

I think part of me realized how messed up this all was because when I heard that memory you said at the interview, Europa and, no doubt, Mom and Dad were all freaking out, but all I could do was sit there and be jealous because I wanted so badly to have that sort of wonderful memory with you. Like it sounded so normal, so peaceful. So ideal. And I wanted it badly. So badly.

I cried myself to sleep that night. Not because you were hurt or because Europa was mad at you. But because I wanted to have a memory like that and go out and look for treasure in our old backyard.


	7. Chapter 7

**_In Exile, Pt II_ **

I met the new doctor.

I’m leaving things out. Shall I back up?

Yes, I probably should if I want this to make ANY sort of sense.

The speech went okay. I pretended that I didn’t see the District 11 tribute standing with her family. Blood dripped down from a laceration in her neck, and she watched me with a sadness that went well beyond pain. I killed her on the first day so that I could have her supplies. Anyway, I gave the speech and everything was fine.

Then we got ready for dinner, and it was similar to District 12’s festivities except there was dancing and I had to dance with a million different people. At least they bathed. I had this stupid concern that they’d just come from the orchard or something dumb and then they wouldn’t have done more than put on fancy clothing. I don’t know why; it’s not like I ever thought badly of District 11 before I came here. Probably because their town is so small and spread out. (Most people live in other towns, or in the more rural sections of the district, I was told.)

Suddenly I was alone in the room.

This great big room with the tables over on one side and the dance floor on the other, and everyone had just vanished and I was standing there by myself in complete silence. Weird, but not as weird as the fact that I just rolled with it. I stepped away from the dance floor and into the hallway. As I walked down the corridor, blood began to run down the grey walls from where the walls met the ceilings. Then it began dripping from the picture frames and windowsills. I reached out and pressed my palm against it. The blood flowed over my fingers and down the back of my hand. Obviously this was bad, so I meandered down the hallway towards the bathroom and stepped inside. It, too, was empty, which didn’t surprise me, but when I turned on the water, the faucet splashed out more blood.

“Well, shoot,” I said because it’s not like I could clean off blood with blood.

“What’s wrong?” came a concerned voice from nowhere. I looked around and couldn’t find its owner.

“Who puts blood in the pipes?” I asked. “Where does it even come from? Is there a reservoir somewhere?”

To that I got no reply.

I shrugged and grabbed paper towels and started trying to smear the blood off my skin. It worked, kind of, though the red tinge still clung to my knuckles and fingernails. With that done, I decided that it would be best to find my sisters because that’s what they had wanted me to do if I was confused. Or something. I couldn’t actually remember what they had told me, but I figured that it’s what they would have wanted me to do. So I left the bathroom behind and headed back to the hallway.

There was a small office a few doors down that was unlocked, so I stepped inside. But the moment that I entered it, I realized that I wasn’t alone, and there was a man sitting behind the desk.

“Can I help you?” he asked gruffly. Despite the irritation in his voice, he had concern in his eyes.

Finding another human being surprised me more than finding the walls dripping blood, so I couldn’t answer right away. I looked down at my hand, which was clean without even a hint of blood.

“I think I need to go,” I said, and I turned around. But the doors flew open and there was Mildred, face red and expression panicked.

“Well _there_ you are,” she said to me, and I looked around her to see both Europa and Isabella behind her. They glanced up and down the hallway for a moment, and then Mildred apologized to the man whose office I had just barged into and whisked me away. She led me down the stairs and into another hallway and then out of doors to a car waiting to take us to the train. And then once we were on the train, I was exiled to my room and told to take a shower. I didn’t. I wrote instead.

Then Isabella came, and she explained to me that I would be seeing a new doctor who was sent specifically to help me while on the Victory Tour.

“I messed up again,” I said, staring down at the notebook in my hands and wondering how the hell I had managed to be so dumb that I couldn’t figure out that what was happening wasn’t real and pretend that it wasn’t happening.

“I hardly call it ‘messing up’ when you can’t help it,” Isabella responded. She lowered herself next to me on the bed. “Listen, what’s happening to you is probably really scary but we’ll—”

“But it’s _not_ , Isabella,” I stated. “It’s not scary at all. It’s really weird, but it just seems so _normal_ to me, like it’s just part of the whole process. I get more concerned about what we’re going to have for dinner than I do that I’ve seen the tributes I’ve killed and blood dripping down the walls and all.”

Isabella started, and I realized that I hadn’t told her—or anyone else—that last part and it kind of came out of the blue.

“Maybe this doctor can help you,” she said, but she was fumbling for words to make things better. Once again we were left in a situation in which neither of us could speak our minds, and therefore we couldn’t actually discuss what needed to be discussed: whether this doctor could be trusted.

“Maybe,” I replied, and we sat in silence until there was another knock at the door.

Isabella stood up and answered it.

“Hello, Dr. Newell,” she said politely.

I stood up and turned to greet the doctor. I might be a mental mess, but I did not want to meet a challenge sitting down. He nodded and greeted Isabella before turning his attention to me. And in his cold smile, I found myself shivering. Still, I squared my shoulders and said hello, and he introduced himself and I introduced myself, even though at this point, there was no real need for introductions.

“I’ll leave you two, then,” Isabella said. “Let me know if you need anything.”

I was going to say that I needed to not have some random person in my room right then, but there weren’t many options on a train like this that was made for carrying people to festivities and not for performing psychiatric evaluations. But I just thanked her, and she disappeared out the bedroom door, leaving me with the doctor.

I’d like to think I’m good at meeting people, and I guess I am. But I’m not _really_ that good. Like I can smile and compliment people and everything, but when it comes to anything more than a superficial display of flattery, I can barely stay standing. That’s why I struggled so much with being in the Career pack last year. I was good at weapons and survival, but I wasn’t good at communication. Dr. Castillo says that there’s a lot of non-verbal communication that goes on such as gestures and postures and eye movement, and I thought I understood it, but I guess I don’t. So there I stood in front of this new doctor, and I had absolutely no idea what to say.

“Please, have a seat,” I said, motioning towards the chair next to the vanity. Manners are good enough. I lowered myself back onto the bed and crossed my legs as he took the chair and sat down.

He’s a strange-looking man. Forty or fifty-ish years old. Brownish-black hair that’s lightly greying around the temples. Average height, average build. Average average average. But I didn’t like the way he looked at me, like I’m just a little creature on a tray to be dissected. His shirt was crisp despite the excessive train travel to catch up with our train, and every movement was just so. It’s like he was an imposter who had perfected the art of being a doctor.

“I wanted to take a few moments to introduce myself,” he said to me, and from there he explained that he works in the Capitol—in a different hospital, he said, a private practice—and he has had years of experience. He didn’t specify what type of experience, or how he actually handled crazy people, but he did say that he has had great success in his career. Again, nothing specific.

At this point, it was nearly 1:00 AM and I was exhausted, so when he gave me a few moments to speak, all I said was, “I’m pretty tired and would like to go to sleep.”

“Of course you are,” he said. He smiled at me, but it wasn’t anything comforting. “We will talk again in the morning.”

He left, and I sat alone on my bed for a few minutes thinking about what this means for me. Actually, I don’t know much. I really am exhausted, and I think I need rest before I can try to piece things together. The fact that they didn’t send someone who has worked with me previously is really weird. Like you’d think it would be important to get someone who already knew about me and could continue the same work, but I guess that just goes to show you how little I know.

Dr. Newell tries to be nice, but I can’t quite get over how his smile doesn’t look genuine. It’s not like it’s forced, it’s like . . . I’m a specimen, and he’s delighted to have me in his little dish to poke and prod. I hope I’m wrong about that.


	8. Chapter 8

**_Travelling through District 10_ **

We get a day off, which is what was built into the schedule, not because of me being insane. I might have thought that was a relief if it weren’t for the fact that my new doctor scares me a little.

He did an evaluation today but didn’t tell me what the results were. There were just a lot of questions I had to answer, and I did the best I could even though I contemplated lying. In the end, he can likely cross-reference what I say here with what I’ve said to the doctors and nurses at the hospital, so there’s no use getting myself confused. But after that, I was free, and he said that he’d call me if he needed anything but otherwise to enjoy my time on the ranch.

Because District 10 and District 11 are close to each other but the Capitol doesn’t want the Victory Tour to be rushed, they space out some of the stops. To fill in the gaps, they have scheduled activities for us. Today’s activity involved visiting a ranch where we were able to see fields and cows and sheep and those sorts of things.

I found Isabella barfing up her lunch in the bathroom of the barn. (It was a fancy barn.)

“So I’m guessing you’re enjoying the tour,” I said to her over the sound of her vomit splashing into the inside of the toilet bowl. She hadn’t bothered to close the stall door. Her back was to me and I couldn’t see her expression. Still, I didn’t need to.

“Shut the fuck up, Avalon,” she snapped. She meant business if she took that sort of tone with me.

It was pretty rude to make Isabella go to a place that was almost identical to her arena, especially considering how messed up the muttations had been. Actual monstrosities that tore apart tributes and drove them into rage and made them turn psycho. How could going to a place like this not bother her? I would have waited for her, but she started swearing at me, so I peed, washed my hands like a normal person, and left the bathroom. Then I put up a wet floor sign so people wouldn’t go in until she was done. Unfortunately she tripped over the sign when she came out, but no one saw except for like three of us.

Europa wouldn’t let me take one of the cows home, even when I promised to milk it every day. I said that if Isolde could have chickens in her yard, then we could have a cow in ours. Sure, it’s not a BIG yard, but I’m sure there’s room for one cow.

The farmers gave us fresh milk straight from a cow (ugh, but I still drank it all anyhow, and I sipped Europa’s when she wasn’t looking just to mess with her), and they let us pet the sheep, too. Europa says no to us getting sheep. Or goats. Or pigs. Or dogs. Or cats. Or chickens. Or anything remotely interesting. She said that I could have a pet rock if I wanted to take care of something.

All in all, it was a pleasant day if you could get over the fact that one of your sister is a grouch and the other one was having traumatic flashbacks because of barn animals.

When we got back to the train, it was time for my afternoon snack, but Europa said I ate enough at lunch to feed five people, and she made me go to the game room with Isolde and Hammer.

“How are you holding up?” Isolde asked as she set up the pool table. She handed me a stick and I took it and pretended I knew what I was doing.

“Oh, you know,” I said noncommittally. “Didn’t see any dead people, so I guess that’s pretty good.”

That cut off the conversation. Maybe Isolde and Hammer tried to say more, but I started poking all the balls on the table with the stick and pushing them into the various holes. No one even bothered to tell me that I was doing it wrong.

“Avalon, if there’s anything Hammer and me can do to help you out, please let us know,” Isolde said.

I paused after I jabbed another ball into a hole and looked up at her. She had an earnestness in her expression, and I knew that she really meant it. But I also didn’t know how to handle it, either. I mean, how do you just roll with the fact that you’re nuts and people around you are trying to be nice, but you shouldn’t be in this position in the first place?

“What did you guys do while we were on the tour?” I asked. “You missed some fresh milk. And lots of cows. I named one Moo-Anna after Blue-Anna.”

Isolde and Hammer exchanged a look. “We kept ourselves busy,” she said. But then she left it at that.

I don’t know, but I’m sensing that people are treating me differently now. Or that they’re trying to keep me at arm’s length. It’s kind of hard to say because everything’s so weird on this Victory Tour and things aren’t as straightforward. Schedules are made with myself and my sisters in mind, so the other victors either have to tag along or find something else to do; maybe this is contributing to a sense of isolation. Or maybe I’m just missing something.

“How is the new doctor?” Hammer asked. He was trying to be casual, but he was definitely fishing for information.

“I guess he’s okay,” I answered with a shrug. As much as I wanted to say that he’s creepy and I don’t trust him, I do have some restraint every now and again. “I don’t know why they bother. I’ll probably have to go back to the hospital as soon as I get home anyhow.”

Once I had sunk all the balls into the holes, I set down my stick on the little rack than held all of the sticks and excused myself.

Normally I like Isolde and Hammer. They won back-to-back Hunger Games and have good rapport with each other, and neither of them are unfriendly with the rest of us. In fact, they go above and beyond to make us feel at home. But I couldn’t help wondering what they were up to and why they were being so strange, like they had something up their sleeves. Anyway, I returned to my car and decided to write again. This time I’ve made some illustrations of some of the cows that I saw. I don’t have anything but this pen, so I can’t color them. Sorry.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next couple chapters have weight / food issues. It's a recurring theme (hence the tags), and I likely won't tag every time it comes up.

**_Before the Speech in District 10_ **

I’m in trouble again, and this time for a completely dumb reason that is so stupid I don’t even want to waste the ink writing it down: I’m too fat for whatever dress Blue-Anna planned to put me in for tonight, and now she’s furiously working to let out the seams a bit to accommodate the unexpected weight. It’s not like I gained ten pounds since she last put me in an outfit, so I don’t know why it’s surprising. Still, it hurt to have my prep team make comments about my weight. I’m not self-conscious about it normally, but it was the first time they weren’t telling me how beautiful I was. No, they were too busy making remarks about how the zipper might pop if they tried to get it into place, and whether it would be better for me to wear something a little more “seemly.”

The situation left me in a foul mood, and then people kept telling me to ignore the remarks and that I’m not fat, but it’s like obviously I am if I can’t fit into my clothes. Then when they couldn’t cheer me up like that, they told me to get over it. Thanks.

Oh, Blue-Anna is calling me back in. Time to go be humiliated again.

**_The Train en route to District 9_ **

They ended up switching dresses to whatever I was supposed to wear in District 9, and then I was put on a diet while Blue-Anna tries to modify the dress to make it less bovine and more grainy. Honestly, I don’t care if she put me in a potato sack at this point.

During my speech, I tried to pretend like the District 10 male was my biggest supporter. It’s a little game I decided to play so that seeing all these dead tributes doesn’t throw me off of anything. Or maybe because I’m just bored.

Funny that this Victory Tour is boring me. There are highlights, sure, but it’s turned from a time of triumph and glory to a slog through the districts. I can’t even pretend that I’m happy anymore, except for when I’m on stage and at the dinners, and then I’m wondering what sort of new hallucinations I’ll experience. It’s almost like that’s the most exciting part of the Victory Tour, even though I dread them. Like, oh, seeing all this blood is really so much better than dining with the fancy people who wish I were dead.

After dinner (which did not have any hallucinations), we victors went to the victor village to spend the evening with District 10 victors: Lady (131st), Colton (123rd), Belle (101st), and Dallas (96th). There were so many people there and I couldn’t keep up with the conversation, so I ended up meandering off. I don’t remember much; it was Belle’s house, and I think I spent the better part of the time just kind of wandering the hallways and poking my nose into places it didn’t belong. Eventually Belle found me curled up underneath a desk where I had settled when exploration grew too boring.

She knelt down next to me and muttered something about her knees not being as young as they used to be, but then she settled into place with her back against the drawers so that she could see me out of the corner of her eye if she turned her head just a little.

“The Victory Tour is always rough,” she said to me.

“I’m a Career,” I answered. And, unspoken: I should be enjoying this. I should be happy and healthy and thriving. I shouldn’t be hallucinating or hiding underneath furniture to get away from people.

Belle seemed to understand this. She’s late fifties or early sixties. Has seen many tributes over the years go to the arena, and she’s had to deal with a couple of younger victors in that time. She swept her long, dusty brown hair over her shoulder and began to braid it absently as she spoke:

“You’re a victor now. No ‘Career’ or ‘Non-Career’ anymore,” she said as her fingers deftly wove together the strands of hair. “You, like all us victors, went to the Hunger Games. You were in a kill or be killed situation. The difference is, you were told that you had to like it. The rest of us never needed to worry about that.”

Of _course_ I liked it. Sure, the situation often wasn’t ideal, but that didn’t mean that I didn’t want to go. To deny my desire to go to the arena meant that I was denying everything I was created to do. It would mean that there was no purpose in winning the Hunger Games. And if there was no point in victory, then what was the point of me?

I figured there was no use arguing with her because she’d probably have some “clever” retort to anything I might say, just how Dr. Castillo does whenever I try to protest something she claims to be true. There’s no winning in those sorts of conversations.

“Do you think you could talk with Europa to see if she will let me have a cow?” I asked.

Belle blinked and stared at me for a second. She probably imagined that her heart-to-heart conversation would go a different way. Maybe with me sobbing wildly or storming away or arguing—but not with me trying to convince her to convince my sister to let me have a farm animal in a townhouse. I smiled at her and she shook her head.

“Why don’t we go back to the living room, Avalon?” she said to me.

I nodded and she pressed her palm against the top of the desk to help haul herself to her feet, and I crawled out from my hiding place. We walked quietly through the hallways and down a set of stairs and back to the room with all the others. The conversation stopped briefly as everyone welcomed me back, and I grinned at them and told them that I had gotten lost staring at a painting in the second-floor corridor. Then everybody went back to chattering again, and I shoved my exhaustion to the side and kept up very well with the flow of words streaming out of people’s mouths.

Shortly before we left, I headed off to the bathroom. When I returned, I heard Belle talking with Europa about our conversation earlier.

Belle: “I tried to talk with her and explain that just because she was a Career that she’s in the same position as the rest of us. She’s having trouble accepting that what happened to her was not a positive thing.”

Europa: “You’re assuming that it was all bad.”

Belle (with exasperation): “No fifteen-year-old girl—or any girl, for that matter—should be in a death match, no matter how well prepared for it she is!”

Europa: “I appreciate your concern, but let us handle this.”

Belle: “Please, Europa, talk with her. She’s really struggling right now.”

Europa: “I’ll see you later, Belle. Thanks for having us over.”

And that was it. Short conversation (which is good for my hand right now, honestly) and then Europa started to search around for me. I slipped away and crept off to the front door. I smiled at my sister as she approached and I pretended that I hadn’t heard a single thing about the conversation.


	10. Chapter 10

**_The Train en route to District 9_ **

Ugh, I have managed to get myself in even MORE trouble, and this time it’s even stupider than anything else: I accidentally plugged up the toilet in my car by trying to flush an apple core. I should have just eaten it rather than trying to dispose of it. Honestly, everyone should just be happy that I’m trying to eat healthy.

But noooo.

Because then that opened up the great inquisition, and they wanted to know how the hell I managed to get ahold of an apple. And I just shrugged. And then the inquisition turned from mere questioning into a hunt, and then next thing I knew, my secret stash of food had been found, and then Europa was chewing me out for sneaking food out of the dining car and that I’m not supposed to be eating between meals and blah blah blah.

If I were still working with Dr. Castillo instead of Dr. Newell (who knows nothing about this book), she would tell me that I should probably give more context as I’m writing this. I don’t know why because it’s not like you don’t already know all this, Isabella, and I don’t think it really needs more explaining, but since I’ve been locked in my room until I’m dragged out to be dressed for tonight’s speech—

Wait, hang on. The train is stopping at a small station.

**_Waiting on a Bench Somewhere in District 9_ **

I’ve officially broken the train by plugging up the toilet with an apple core. I mean, I guess that’s an accomplishment.

**_Still Waiting, But Like an Hour Later_ **

Just kidding, it was because they found the rest of the trash I shoved down the toilet, too.

**_I Think We Might Miss Our Next Stop_ **

Then they asked themselves, if this is what they found in one toilet, then could it be possible that I had thrown trash into other toilets?

Short answer: yes.

**_Back on the Train, Now Officially Delayed But Still en route to District 9_ **

Dr. Castillo says that I hoard food and that it’s normal given my situation but that it’s something I have to stop doing. So we’ve been working on it, and she was trying to teach me how to not hoard food or gorge myself whenever I eat and all that entails. Obviously it’s not something I’ve gotten over yet. But everyone—well, Europa and Isabella, and probably Isolde, too—has been told to keep an eye on me and my meals are closely watched to make sure that I don’t eat more than I’m supposed to and that I don’t try to steal anything from the table. But it turns out that everyone’s kind of shit at doing that and they all assume that I’m just a perfect, well-behaved angel when their backs are turned.

And now EVERYONE on the train knows that it’s an issue, and it’s turned into a big deal. Blue-Anna wants me to be on a diet so that I’ll fit back in the clothes she’s already made me, but Europa told her to fuck off, and then there was a verbal fight about it and I slinked back to my room as one of the prep team members started commenting on how it was going to be hard to do my makeup if my face gets too fat and I kind of wanted to stab her in the throat but I didn’t.

Isabella came and joined me after awhile and told me that I should write about it, so that’s what I’m doing. I don’t know what else there is to say except that I wish I didn’t have to wear all these dresses because then no one would care.

I don’t know why I do it. Well, Dr. Castillo has given me her psychobabble interpretation. But honestly, it’s not even like I’m _that_ hungry. I just—I mean, I see food and I have to have it. Most of the time I hide it away for later, unless it’s something like a meal, in which case I just eat as much as I can until sometimes I make myself sick. This never used to be a problem until

Fine, I’ll write it, because for some reason I feel like Isabella _knows_ what I’m trying to avoid saying, and she’s using her mind to scold me for trying to avoid it.

This never used to be a problem until the Hunger Games.

There, okay?

But I don’t think it’s the Hunger Games’ fault, and I’m not just saying that, either. It’s probably from before that, when I was still training. I don’t know all the details. Dr. Castillo says it’s because I didn’t always have a reliable source of food when I was growing up, which I just scoff at because _obviously_ I did if I was eating enough to not waste away during my training. She listed several other possible reasons why I might do this, but I won’t bother wasting time to write them all down.

So now my room feels completely foreign since they’ve gone through and searched through every little nook and cranny to find any hint of food. I figured they would if they found the trash in the toilet, which is why I brought this notebook with me off the train despite the risks of somebody seeing me with it. I think I’m going to have to come up with better hiding spots for my food now that everybody has figured me out. That and not flush trash down the toilet. (Okay, so as an aside: honestly I had no idea what the hell I was supposed to do with the trash because I didn’t want people to see it in the waste bins. Not that I expected anyone but the avoxes who tend this train to be going through the trash but I also don’t really trust everyone to not get into my business. So I just flushed everything and figured that the disposal system on the train had to be one of the best in the country.)

I’m trying not to be an ass when I say here—and only here because I can’t say it out loud—but I’m actually hungry for real right now. Our visit to District 9 has been pushed back a day on account of the delays, and it seems that everybody else has forgotten that we’re supposed to be eating dinner tonight. So I guess I’ll just stay quiet here and let my grumbly stomach do the complaining.


	11. Chapter 11

**_The Train en route to District 9_ **

This morning I had a session with Dr. Newell. I still don’t trust him, but I figured that I could at least spend a little bit of time complaining about the new diet I’m on (Blue-Anna won because Mildred sided with her, and the prep team couldn’t avoid voicing their own opinions, too). It’s not like they’re starving me, but it’s really stupid because I don’t think anyone actually cares about _me_. They only care about what I look like. And now the dining car is locked with a damned padlock, and the avoxes have been told that I’m not allowed to coerce them to get me more food.

Then after I complained, I asked the good doctor: “What do you plan on doing about this?”

He raised an eyebrow. “I am not here to break down the dining car door, Avalon,” he said to me.

I huffed.

“I assumed that they had given you my file from Dr. Castillo,” I stated, folding my arms across my chest.

“Yes, they did,” he said. “And I read it in full.”

“Then you know that Dr. Castillo doesn’t lock the door to the dining room,” I stated. “Nor does she withhold food from me.”

He assessed me carefully then. I caught a look of amusement in his eyes, like hearing me say this was just the most fascinating thing ever. But it’s true—Dr. Castillo doesn’t hold the food prisoner from me. In fact, she insists that food is always available. But then she employs other techniques so that I’m not always grazing for something to eat.

“Dr. Castillo and I have different methods,” he said. “Both are equally valid.”

“So what’s your method?” I demanded. “Just let everyone do whatever they want with little regard to your patient’s needs?”

“Your needs are being met,” he said. “You are receiving an adequate amount of food.”

I stared at him. Of course my needs were being met. If anyone even _thought_ about not giving me enough food, Europa would probably throw them off the moving train. She already had a fit when they decided that I needed a diet, and she wouldn’t allow them to cut out too many calories. But what was _Dr. Newell_ doing for me?

“So that’s it?” I asked, a sinking feeling welling up in my stomach. “You’re not going to help me?”

“Who says I’m not helping you?” he asked.

I furrowed my brow. It’s pretty clear that he wasn’t helping me. Listen, I don’t want anyone to feel sorry for me, but the truth is that I was doing pretty good under Dr. Castillo’s care, all things considered. And now Dr. Newell comes here and his “method” of helping involves doing absolutely nothing. What gives?

“Why are you actually here?” I dropped my voice down so that it no longer bore any anger. It was a question based in curiosity.

“To help you—”

I rolled my eyes. “But why _you_?” I asked. “Why not somebody I’ve worked with previously? Or, well, anyone else.”

He wouldn’t answer my question. Instead he gave me some bullshit about how he was honored to have been given the opportunity to work with me, and that he is really looking forward to the time we’re spending together during the Victory Tour, and he hopes that I’ll make great progress. The more he talked, the more I realized that he’s not here to help me at all. He’s not even some token doctor here to pretend that he’s helping me. He’s literally making the situation worse by not doing anything about the absolute mutiny that’s going on here.

“Can I go now?” I asked after a couple minutes of useless dialogue.

He seemed like he wanted more out of this conversation but only said, “Sure. Let me know if you need anything.”

That would probably be the last thing I’d do because he wasn’t helping me in the first place. But I thanked him and headed out of the lounge car that had been cleared out for our session.

I don’t understand why they’d bother sending a doctor who was making things worse by not doing his job. He can say what he want about having a different approach than Dr. Castillo, but it’s just an excuse for the fact that he has no intention of actually being a doctor. So what is the point of having him around?

Admittedly, it took me awhile to warm up to Dr. Castillo. Never before I had I talked about my life with anyone. My sisters already knew the sort of crap I’d dealt with—at least, to an extent—and I had no friends to talk with, so there was never any need to start sharing deeply personal things with anyone. My parents would have been pissed off if they had known the sorts of things I was talking about. And I have to say that I felt a bit guilty talking about some of these things in therapy, like I was betraying the parents who worked hard to make sure that I fulfilled my dreams. But at the same time, I found that I was desperate to share with someone even a small drop of the life I lived. When the staff revealed that the things I experienced weren’t normal by any means, it only made me want to talk more, at least a little. And over time, I felt more comfortable sharing about my history.

But Dr. Newell is different. Where Dr. Castillo and her staff made me feel more comfortable, Dr. Newell does the opposite. Sure, it’s a different method, but I doubt that each is equally valid.

I found Europa so that I could go over tonight’s speech again. We had started to go over it yesterday before we realized that the speech would be postponed, but I definitely needed to give it another shot. Then after that, Blue-Anna had me try on tonight’s outfits to make sure that she had adjusted them appropriately. Nobody said anything as they shoved the zipper into place, but they didn’t need to for me to know that they were all thinking how problematic my weight is.

Once they were reasonably sure that I was able to fit into my clothes, the released me and I headed back to the lounge car. Here I watched us go through District 9. Once again, snow covered everything, but occasionally I’d see a little snow-topped house out in the middle of nowhere.

“No cities, huh?” I asked Europa.

“There are a couple,” she answered, her eyes watching out towards the open fields. “Most people live in rural areas, though they’re connected by small towns. A hundred people in a town, even more living out in the rural areas. Except for near the bigger processing plants, which are closer to the cities.”

“Do people own their own farms?” I asked as I pressed my forehead to the cold window and stared outside. I would have thought that they all lived together and travelled out to whatever fields they worked in, but clearly that wasn’t the case.

“No idea,” she said. “Take a look at the houses—especially if we find one closer to the railroad tracks.”

So I kept my eyes out on the little snow-covered dots. Some closer, some farther. Then finally after many minutes of waiting and searching, I saw a strange little structure peeking out of the snow. It was weird because it wasn’t made of wood or concrete or brick, but the train blew past it so fast that I wasn’t able to get a very good look.

“What _is_ it?” I asked.

“It’s a sod house,” she said. She tapped her finger against the window as we passed another one, and I squinted to see it better. “It is literally made of dirt and grass.”

“And they all live like that?” I turned away from the window and stared at her.

She shrugged. “Not all. Just some. A few have wooden houses, but I think they have enough grassfires that they have to be careful about what they make their buildings from,” she said.

I shuddered at the thought of living in a dirt hole for all eternity. That was pretty much like being buried except without the coffin. And what would happen when it rained? Would the water just trickle in through the dirt and make it a muddy slurry? I turned back to the window as though I might see this process in action, but of course I didn’t.

What a terrible way to live. Dirt and mud and grass. Out in the middle of nowhere. Yuck.

Time for the speech, so I need to finish writing here.

**_The Train en route to District 8_ **

Do you remember Jessica? I killed her after finding out that she was going to poison me. Europa sent me the message with a simple sponsorship gift of bread that it was time to eliminate my ally, and I immediately turned on her. She crumpled beneath my questioning, and then I killed her. They replayed the scene over and over—it was one of the highlights of the Hunger Games.

I still feel the blood spurting out from her neck onto my body. Warm.

Comforting.

Closer.


	12. Chapter 12

**_The Train en route to District 8_ **

I laughed. I almost laughed.

To see her standing there on the platform with her family, blood gushing from her neck. I felt it on my skin. Warmth. If I looked down, I’m sure I would have seen it splattered all over my pretty dress and across my body. But I kept my head up and recited the speech, notecards forgotten in my hands. And as I did, I stared straight at Jessica.

I don’t know why I felt like laughing.

I didn’t want to kill her even though I knew I was going to because it was the Hunger Games and that’s how things went.

She didn’t give me much of an option. Not when she planned to poison my dinner. I did what I had to do.

But would you like to know a secret? There was a hidden scene in the Hunger Games, one that occurred after I killed her. They showed me gathering the things I needed, then standing up and walking away. However, they didn’t show that I started sobbing like a maniac when I was no more than a few feet from her corpse. I just doubled over and started wailing without caring that I’d lose sponsorships over it, or if it meant that one of the others would hear me, too.

I killed my friend.

Friend?

She wasn’t really my friend. But then again, I haven’t ever had many friends to begin with, so for all I know, that’s what a friendship was supposed to be like. I remember a few times when I was a kid that I had people I referred to as friends, but those didn’t last long. Did you know that Mom and Dad told me to push one of my friends off the playground jungle gym? I did it. She fell and broke her leg in two places. And she screamed. We were seven years old or so. All that time, and I still hear her terrible cries. So I guess if that’s the sort of friendships you have growing up, then something like this would make sense. That’s what Dr. Castillo said, at any rate.

I never told you about this episode because I was ashamed by it. Mom and Dad told me to do it, but I knew it was wrong, but if they were the ones who said it, could it really be wrong? It was Mom, mostly. She wanted to make sure that I was able to hurt somebody if I needed to so that I wouldn’t get too attached to my allies in the arena. Obviously it was for the Hunger Games, so it must be good. Then why did I feel so bad when I heard my friend scream like that?

Jessica was my friend, and then she tried to kill me, and then I killed her. That’s just how friendship goes.

(No, I know it doesn’t.)

I never knew anything about Jessica besides the little that she told me. We both knew that our alliance was a precarious one, and that I’d turn on her if she didn’t turn on me, and I clearly had the upper hand despite being so much younger than her. But as I stood there on the stage and gave my speech, I wondered what she was like. There were two other girls and a boy up there with her parents, all of them younger than her. She was that family’s Europa, and now she was gone.

Funny, huh?

No, I guess it isn’t.

I don’t think I’m doing a very good job explaining myself.

During dinner, there were the usual festivities—dinner and toasts and dancing and music and blood on the walls and dead bodies piled in the corners and laughing and cheering. I met some nice people, and I wondered if they all lived in the ground and how they managed to clean up so well. I guess that we were in a city, so most of the people there probably all lived in normal buildings and houses here and not in little dirt dwellings out on the prairie. The District 9 victors were very kind to me, though I didn’t pay as much attention as I probably should have because I was concerned about the bloated corpses sitting propped up in a few of the chairs. But now I know that they weren’t real, but they seemed so lifelike.

I’ll have to ask Dr. Newell what makes me recreate things like that.

Against my better judgement, I leaned over and stroked the blue-grey swollen cheek of one of the corpses and felt it flinch beneath my fingers. The skin was cold beneath my fingertips. The corpse said something to me without moving its mouth because its mouth had been sewn shut. I tapped my fingers against my own lips and wondered how much that hurt.

You’d think that I would have figured out that it was an actual person I was touching and I was just, like, imagining that it was a dead person. But I was completely convinced that it was a corpse, and I was okay touching it like that. Fortunately, I managed to keep my mouth shut because there was still that part of me that understood that this wasn’t real. That makes no sense at all.

I poured out my beverage glass to see if it was full of blood, but it wasn’t, and then the tablecloth was soaking wet with plain ol’ water. At that point, Europa asked me if we could take a walk, and I said sure. I didn’t say that I wanted to walk because I was curious what was going on outside this great hall of eating and feasts. Were there more corpses out there? Or was everything normal again?

Europa led me out of the room and into the hallway. No more blood on the walls, but things didn’t really look _right_ , either. It was like everything in the room was too loud, even when nothing was making a sound at all.

“Are you okay?” Europa asked.

“Probably not,” I answered.

She looked uneasily around us. “Do you think you could hold out for another few minutes until we’re officially dismissed, or should I see if Mildred can cover for us?”

“Oh, yeah, I’ll be alright,” I answered. But once the words were out of my mouth, I wondered if it was true.

She studied me for a moment before she nodded and took me back to the table where I plopped down in my seat across from what had once been some man with a handlebar mustache but was now Jessica. Her mouth moved, but I heard no words; she was trying to tell me something, yet it eluded me.

I don’t really remember what happened after that, but Isabella says that I told “Jessica” that I thought dead people were supposed to stay dead. I think that it’s a valid point, but Isabella looked flustered when she mentioned it, and I’m sure she wasn’t alone because I was hauled out of the dinner so fast that I almost forgot where I was to begin with. It wasn’t until I was back here in my room curled with a blanket underneath the bed that things started to return to normal.

Okay, I’ve already established that this doesn’t really scare me, which in itself actually scares me. But I think what disturbs me more is the fact that it lasted so long and it wasn’t until I was here on the train that I escaped back to reality.

So that all happened last night.

This morning, they had me speak with Dr. Newell about it all. He wanted to know what I saw, so I told him because there’s no use hiding it from him when it’s obvious that there’s something wrong with me. He just nodded and said “Mmmhmm” and “I see” at various points, and then when I was finished, a silence fell between us.

“What do you think causes all of this?” he asked me.

“Um. Stress?” I suggested. “Isabella said it’s possible to be stressed and excited at the same time.”

Except, as I’ve mentioned, I’m not really that excited. Yet I’m a Career and I know I should be, and if there’s any bit of truth I’ll withhold from everyone, it’s that.

Then he asked me some questions about what exactly I saw, how many bodies there were (what?), etc. I answered them to the best of my ability, but it wasn’t like I had memorized everything. Then I—

Hang on, there’s some commotion in the hallway.

You know what, I don’t care. I’m just going to continue writing.

My visit with Dr. Newell didn’t give me any sort of satisfaction or appreciation for the stupid way my brain works. Sometimes that’s what it’s like with Dr. Castillo. She calls it validation. Doesn’t mean that things are right or wrong, she says, just that I’m being heard and understood.

I left the session wondering again about Jessica. I knew that she had to die, and yet seeing her there with her family makes me realize that I really destroyed them. I singlehandedly upended that family and tore them apart so that I could live. And then I did live, and I turned around and tore my own family apart. If I had died, then there would have been two families intact.

No, wait, that’s not true. If I had died, then there would have been no one to protect Isabella and Europa from Mom and Dad’s plans. This is all so

Ugh! Why is everyone shouting? I’m going to go find out.


	13. Chapter 13

**_Still en Route to District 8, One Real Dead Body Later_ **

Mildred is dead.

So the commotion was for a good reason. Blue-Anna found her sitting in the lounge car with a knife in her face. I wanted to go in and see, but Europa grabbed me and held me back in the hallway of the adjacent car. She grasped me tightly so I couldn’t wiggle away, but her attention wasn’t on me as she stared at the lounge car door.

“Don’t go in there,” she hissed under her breath.

“I’ve seen worse,” I said.

“I don’t care,” she snapped. “You need to get back to your car.”

But she was still holding onto me, and one of the train workers apologized for the inconvenience of asking us to move to another car so that this area could be blocked off for Peacekeeper investigation when we stopped at the next train station. Now that other people had started to move by us and it was unlikely that I’d start shoving them out of the way for a glimpse at a proper dead body, Europa released her tight hold on me.

“C’mon,” she said, and she led me to the next car over, taking us further away from the crime scene. I reluctantly followed after her, throwing the occasional glance behind us just in case I’d see something when the door opened. I didn’t.

We found many people in the gaming car. Blue-Anna sat in a chair, sobbing hysterically, and people surrounded her and tried to comfort her. Other people—victors, prep team, a couple of avoxes—milled around and stared blankly at each other.

“I’m guessing this is not a normal feature of a Victory Tour,” I said to Europa.

She turned and glared at me, and I shifted my eyes down to the floor. I’d take that as my answer.

Here we were, a whole bunch of people who embraced death as either trained killers or those who supported them, and no one knew how to deal with the fact that one single murder had taken place on the train. I had to do everything in my power to keep a straight face at this thought because I knew that it was not something that would be taken lightly. Last thing I want to do is have people think that I—the crazy one—thought it would be a wonderful day to stab people in the face.

Which, by the way, is a dumb way to kill someone. There are far more efficient ways to end a life. Which makes me think that whoever did this was just doing it for attention. It seemed like something other Careers would try to do just to show how cool they were. I can’t remember how many kids over the years would list off ridiculous things like this as great ways to kill off a tribute.

Nobody dared to leave the car, and despite all the forms of entertainment around us, no one took the opportunity to let off steam at the pool table or with darts. I guess that would have been in bad taste right now even though there was literally nothing we could have done to help the situation. Finally the train started to slow down as we approached a small station, and within minutes a whole bunch of Peacekeepers filed onto the train and began their work.

If this were a routine murder, it would only require the local police force to investigate, but since Mildred was murdered on the Victory Tour, they bring in the Peacekeepers. That’s what happens for the important people or important places. When Mom and Dad died, it was mostly local police at first, but then the Peacekeepers took over pretty quickly. Not because Mom and Dad were important but because I was. I imagine that if the local police were left to their own devices, they would have charged me for murder, so I assume that the Peacekeepers were able to erase any suspicion of my involvement. So as I sit here writing, I wonder to myself and this paper whether this case will get the proper treatment that it should.

**_Delayed en route to District 8_ **

Once more, we’re delayed, though fortunately this time isn’t because of me. Unfortunately it’s because somebody’s dead, but what’s done is done.

It’s too bad because even though Mildred wanted me on a diet, she was actually a nice person.

Okay, anyway, the Peacekeepers went through the train and questioned each of us as to where we were at the time of the murder. I, of course, was sitting in my car writing. It’s not a very good alibi, but what can you do? I didn’t tell them that I was writing, only that I was in my car by myself. I’d rather be accused of murder than have this notebook be evidence for my innocence because certainly _someone_ would eventually crack the code and then I’d be killed for my insubordination, even though I’m not really insubordinate, just confused about everything.

Dr. Newell is having a therapy session for everyone who wants to come tonight after dinner. I don’t want to go but I might as well so that people don’t think I’m heartless. I’m not heartless, I promise you. I just—I mean—

(This is the most exciting thing that’s happened on the Victory Tour so far.)


	14. Chapter 14

**_The Train en route to District 8_ **

We were supposed to do the speech and dinner today, but due to yesterday’s murder and the subsequent delays, we have been set back a day.

The train stopped at another small station so that Mildred’s body and whatever evidence could be removed. There was discussion because some people wanted to swap out this lounge car for another one that was a little less murdery, but that would have put us way far behind because we’d have to wait for another lounge that was suitable for our purposes. You wouldn’t want a Victory Tour train to have just _any_ old lounge, would you? So we still have the one that the escort was murdered in.

Isolde is now our unofficial escort as we wait for them to send another one. I only say that because she keep wandering around checking on people to make sure that they’re okay. This includes me, too.

“Avalon, how are you holding up?” she asked me as she paused by my car.

“Oh, I’m doing just fine,” I told her.

She smiled at me, but it seemed a bit strained. Then she said, “Go ahead and let me know if there is anything you need, okay?”

“Sure,” I said. She turned to leave, but before she stepped out the door, I found myself saying, “Isolde? How about you? Are you okay?”

She gave me a genuine smile then. “Thanks for asking,” she said. She turned back around, glanced out the door, and then closed it so that we were 100% alone. Possible cameras and microphones aside. “I don’t know what’s going to happen next, but I think things are about to get a bit crazy. It would be best if we all stuck together.”

“We’re not going to play murder mystery, are we?” I asked skeptically.

Isolde laughed, the dimples on her cheeks pronounced. “I really hope not,” she answered. “I’m sure that things will settle down eventually, but a death on a Victory Tour will certainly ruffle a few feathers.”

After she left, I headed out to the lounge car. They’d cleaned it up and swapped out furniture and a rug, so it was pretty clear where Blue-Anna had found Mildred’s body. I sat there staring at the replacement furniture for awhile. I decided to run my own experiment: can I commune with all dead people or only the ones I’ve killed? In my attempts to understand this magical ability I have (because honestly sometimes it’s nice to think of yourself as magical and not crazy), I stared at the furniture. This is how Isabella found me.

“Avalon, what are you doing?” Isabella asked with concern as she stepped in the car.

“Trying to find Mildred,” I answered.

“She’s dead, Avalon,” my sister said sternly. “C’mon, let’s go to the game car and hang out for a bit and not think about dead people. Please?”

She sounded so pathetic with the desperate little “please?” tagged into the end that I had no choice but to turn away and follow her through the train to the game car. At any rate, I don’t think I can see dead people unless I killed them, and since I didn’t kill Mildred, I can’t see her. Not something that will uphold in a court, but still good to know anyhow.

In the gaming car, we found the other victors. Hammer, Isolde, and Jericho were at the pool table with their sticks. They seemed to be mid-game, and they glanced up as soon as the door opened. Cronus and Europa were playing darts, though it appeared they’d given up only two darts into the game and were making comments about the scenery that flew by us. They, too, turned and looked at Isabella and myself. Luna sat in a large green beanbag playing videogames on a massive television.

“Hey, Avalon, I’m getting tired of racing the computer—come play with me,” Luna said as she patted a beanbag next to hers.

It’s rare to find all the victors in one place. Partly because there are so many of us and partly because we all have varying interests. But I guess death _does_ bring us all together. I shuffled over to Luna and plopped down on the bright blue beanbag next to hers. She leaned over and picked up a second controller which she then handed to me.

“I’m not very good at this,” I told her as I gripped the controller in my palms.

She smiled at me. “Don’t worry about it,” she said.

Luna won the 108th Hunger Games but doesn’t do a whole lot of mentoring anymore since there are so many of us. In school, we learned all about the various victors. This included not just their names and information about their Hunger Games, but also who mentored what years, and which victors brought tributes to victory. As soon as District 1 started to rack up a lot of victors, she stepped back and let the newer people try their hand.

I’m dreading mentoring, if I can admit that here. In some ways, it will be like training again as you prep for the arena.

Anyway, Luna is nice enough. She has always been a pleasant neighbor when we used to live in victor village, and she says that she keeps an eye on the houses to make sure that things stay in order. Not that it matters because I don’t know if my sisters and I will ever return to District 1 to live, but it’s nice to have a place to stay for when we visit. Three houses is a bit overkill, but it’s not like you can say that one will do when it’s quite the honor for a family to have three victors.

I quickly grew bored of getting last place in the racing game, and the controls were a little weird.

“I’ve never played this before,” I said to Luna after the third race in which she had to wait three whole extra minutes for me to find my way back to the finish line.

“There might be a game here you’re more familiar with,” she said to me as she paused the screen and began to exit the game.

“Oh. No, I mean that I’ve never played any videogames before,” I told her.

Luna raised an eyebrow. “Child, you’ve got to be kidding me,” she said. “We come from the _luxury_ district, and you’re telling me that you’ve never played a single videogame in your life?”

I sank down into the beanbag and clutched the controller in my sweaty hands. I didn’t need to tell her that it wasn’t part of training because that had become something of a mantra since my victory. People will ask me, “Do you like XYZ?” and I’ll have to admit that I’ve never done/read/watched/heard of XYZ because it wasn’t part of my Career training and therefore wasn’t allowed.

Luna must’ve realized this because she said, “Don’t you worry, we’ll make a gamer out of you yet.”

She exited the game and pulled up a screen with a whole bunch of different titles. Very few of them I had heard about, so I was thankful that she didn’t ask me what I wanted to play. Finally she chose one and settled back into the beanbag.

“I think you’ll like this one,” she said to me with a smile. “It has monsters and dragons and adventure. An old game—not the best of controls—but simple enough that you won’t have a problem figuring them out.”

The screen began to play a video, and I turned my attention away from Luna. The more I watched, the more intrigued I became. But then I was thrown into the game without any warning, and I immediately had to start mashing buttons to keep my character alive. The mechanics frustrated me, but within minutes, I was hooked and managed to work out that each button had a different function and I had to press them at the right time to get my character to do the right thing. In some ways, it was far simpler than the racing game.

Then the next thing I knew, it was time for lunch. Isolde stood above me and told me for the second time that I had to get up and off to the dining car. I stared up at her and blinked for a second. The crazy thing was that at first I didn’t want to leave my beanbag because I was so engrossed in the game. But finally I came to my senses, paused the game, and set down the controller. It was only then that I realized that Luna had long since left my side.

I’d been tricked. She wanted something to occupy my attention, so she had gotten me interested in this game and then went to do other things. Damnit.

And yet I found myself asking Isolde, “Can I come back to this later?”


	15. Chapter 15

**_The Train en route to District 7_ **

This will be our longest stretch without a speech and dinner since District 7 is completely on the other side of the country.

But about District 8:

Firstly, it’s a stark contrast to District 9 because everything in District 8 is pretty much just buildings. Just buildings. There’s more to it, I’m told, but that’s all I saw. Like there was nothing, and then there was a whole bunch of buildings and factories everywhere. People live in apartment complexes here, and then they just have to take a quick walk to get to work. Sounds good enough to me, except that they all work in these disgusting factories. Okay, maybe they’re not disgusting, but they’re large and loud and echoing. I know because they gave us a quick tour before the speech and proudly showed us where the fabric comes from for some of the designer clothes and purses we make in District 1. I mean, I _guess_ that’s interesting.

I never had to worry about finding a job in District 1. In school, there was a focus in training kids to eventually do something for the district’s industry, though it’s a given that not everyone will take that path. Sometimes we’d take tours of hat shops or jewelers. Once we went into a factory that made watches, and let me tell you that it did _not_ look like this. It was really small, for one thing, and everything was handcrafted rather than being made on these loud, creepy machines that could mash you into a pulp if you accidentally moved 0.3 inches out of place. Anyway, some kids in school wanted to design things and others wanted to have the honor of creating things that the Capitol minds had come up with. Some people just weren’t into this sort of stuff and chose other things, like operating wineries or raising ferrets and foxes to be made into fur coats. I, on the other hand, never needed to worry about that stuff because I would be a victor. So instead I focused on what my victor talent would be.

(I still haven’t decided.)

The second thing about District 8 is that it’s so weirdly _bright_ despite all of the factories. This surprised me because I’ve seen pictures of the factories in text books and they looked dismal and depressing. And they probably would have looked that way still if it weren’t for the brightly colored tapestries and clothing and awnings and umbrellas and everything else that gave life to the grey city streets where the snow had turned to mush and ice coated the sidewalks.

So it was no surprise that their stage was decorated the most vibrantly of all the districts I’ve visited so far. It must’ve taken little to no effort to make it seem so celebratory because there’s just so much fabric everywhere that they can grab the nearest thing and string it up between lamp posts and across the overhangs.

And the best thing ever was that this is the first time that I’ve been to a district while on this Victory Tour where I haven’t killed anyone!

So that meant no dead person on stage with the fallen tributes’ families.

But as I gave my speech, something within me stirred. Now that I no longer had a dead face to look at, I found myself focusing on the families. The pain in their expressions. The tears running down their cheeks despite their struggles to remain composed. I might not have killed their children, but their kids were dead anyhow, and they’d never get them back.

I finished my speech flawlessly, and yet I found myself wondering why we do this. Why do we have the Victory Tour? Why do we have the Hunger Games?

Do I dare even write more about that in my secret coded book?

I shouldn’t. Because then I might find myself thinking more about it outside of the book, and that’s not what I’m supposed to do. This is a celebration of my success, and I can’t let it get ruined by thinking things that I’m not supposed to.

But it was still on my mind when we went to dinner, and despite the distraction, I found myself more engaged with the people around me than I had been before. I met a bunch of folks whose names and faces I’ll never remember, and then they had some school kids come up and perform dances for us with fabric streaming behind them like strange birds whose wings flutter through the air. It was curious, but I quite enjoyed it, and it allowed me to take my mind off the fact that there were bloodied footprints on the floor around me, leading away through the room and out the door into the hallway. The kids might have been like eight or nine years old, and they were so proud of their dance and they were actually really good.

Eventually I excused myself to use the restroom because once the kids finished up, I couldn’t stop staring at the floor where the blood coagulated on the thin carpet. I tried not to stare at it as I followed the footprints because I didn’t want people to think I was crazy, and then I found myself in the hallway where they stopped right in front of a window. So I looked out the window into the night where snow drifted down through the darkness. I couldn’t see much else, but it was peaceful, and I silently thanked the footprints for bringing me here so I could get away from the chaos of the party for a couple of minutes. But I had to return, so I tore myself away from the window. The footprints were gone, and I headed back into the room to sit back down with the others.

We met the District 8 victors, of which there are only a few. Esther is the most recent. She won the 138th Hunger Games at thirteen years of age. We in District 1 are a little bitter about that because she killed a very capable District 1 tribute in the finale, and it was probably more luck than anything else. But once you meet her, you see that she’s actually a really nice person so it’s a good thing that she’s alive. Then there’s also Calico, who won the 112th Hunger Games. She’s a stern woman who says nothing more than what’s needed. Not that she’s rude or unfriendly, but she did the absolute minimum to engage with us whereas Esther tried to be friendly and make me feel welcomed. She’s Isolde’s friend, though, and so the two of them have spent many years mentoring together. There was another District 8 victor, but he spent the entire time drinking and so I stayed away from him. He’s an old man—he actually won the year before grandma—and I’m not sure how his liver has held up from the alcohol if he’s been drinking like this since he was younger. Maybe the Capitol replaces his liver every now and again? I don’t know how that works.

Esther invited us over for the evening, but Isolde explained that we had to get going right away to make up for lost time. It was kind of a bummer because I think I would have liked seeing District 8’s victor village. But we bid the other victors goodbye and Isolde led our little party back to the train. I think she does a good job in Mildred’s absence.

We now will have two full days before I have to give our speech in District 7. Technically I don’t have to worry about staying up too late right now because there’s nothing to do tomorrow, but the sooner I sleep, the sooner I wake up, and the sooner I can start playing videogames!


	16. Chapter 16

**_The Train en route to District 7_ **

Oh boy. What is wrong with this train?

Blue-Anna is dead now. She was found by one of the prep team members, Cynthia, in the dining car where she had been poisoned. So now we have the following problems:

  1. The biggest is that Blue-Anna is dead. Obviously. I wasn’t happy about her putting me on a diet, but otherwise I liked her, and she always was kind to my sisters and me. I try to put my feelings into words about this, but I can’t really come up with anything to say. Sad. Confused. But I know I should be, like, completely freaked out. And hysterical.
  2. Cynthia now thinks that she’s going to die next because Blue-Anna found Mildred’s body, and now she found Blue-Anna’s. So nobody can console her, and she keeps saying that she wants to get off the train, and Isolde and Europa keep reminding her that we are in the middle of nowhere and she had a job to do.
  3. Every scrap of food has been taken from us and locked away. Every single one. The Peacekeepers will board the train at the next stop and cart it away for inspection, but that leaves us with no food. And no drinks because some of the staff are terrified that everything is poisoned, even the stuff that’s pre-packed and bottled with tamper-evident seals.



The good news is that she didn’t die in the gaming car, so everyone has been congregating in there and people are fine with me playing my videogame as long as I don’t disturb their conversation. I have this ability to pay attention to two things at once, so I can play my game and eavesdrop at the same time. Not that I can really call it eavesdropping when they’re talking right in front of me, but I’m not really part of the discussion and they seem to be fine with that.

The other victors speak in hushed tones about what the hell is happening. The death of one person was disturbing enough, but now two people have died? Who the hell is killing everyone?

Whenever the conversation gets juicy, I pause my game and start fiddling with the inventory system. It’s a challenge to try to figure out what items to carry since there’s only a limited amount of space. It’s kind of like the Hunger Games, in some way. Anyhow, I can do this at the same time as honing into what they’re saying. It goes something like this:

Isolde: “Unless told otherwise, I guess we just carry on.”

Europa: “I don’t see why not. It’s not like we can just cancel the Victory Tour because a couple people died.”

Hammer: “Don’t show _too_ much concern there, Europa.”

Europa (with irritation): “Look, I’m sorry they died, I am. But the Victory Tour has to continue. Do you think either Mildred or Blue-Anna would want us to just stop it and go home?”

Isolde: “What Hammer is trying to say is that you need to show a little more compassion about their deaths. You’re right that they would want us to continue on, but until we figure out who actually did this, we should all be careful about what we say.”

Isabella dragged over a beanbag and sat down next to me. Our older sister has a way with words. And by that I mean that she can be really pigheaded once she gets her mind set on something. Anything Hunger Games related takes priority over, well, anything else. Including a bunch of random killings on our Victory Tour train. Isabella knows this, and she, like me, understood that staying out of this conversation was a wise choice.

Europa: “Fine. What’s the plan?”

Jericho: “We need to stick together. Nobody goes anywhere alone.”

Isolde: “I second that. If we all pair off and don’t get separated, it would be for the best.”

Europa: “I think we can take care of ourselves.”

Jericho: “Sure we can. But only if somebody is trying to murder us. However, I can’t speak for anyone else, but I don’t want to be accused of murder.”

So then they spent several minutes trying to divide us into pairs. At first they wanted my sisters and I to stick together, but then Luna pointed out that we all have vastly different interests and might end up squabbling if we try to all stay in the same room all the time. So she said that since I’ve made myself quite familiar with the videogame systems that she will stay here with me (Hammer: “Is that why you got her hooked, Luna? So that you’ll have somebody to play videogames with?”), Europa and Isolde will be buddies, Isabella and Hammer, and Jericho and Cronus.

Then Isabella and I were pulled into the conversation.

“For the time being, we are going to go everywhere in pairs,” Isolde told all of us victors. “We are going to eat—if they give us food—, sleep, and hang out together the entire time until the issue is resolved. We cannot leave our partners, even for a minute.”

“Do you really think one of us did this?” Isabella asked.

Isolde shrugged. “Like Jericho, I’m thinking that we want to make sure that no one here is accused of anything,” she said. “I think that the Victory Tour is likely to continue regardless of who died or how many, so it’s best to be prepared.”

There was a bit more discussion after that, but I slipped away and plopped back down on the beanbag. Nice to know that everyone thinks the Murder Express is going to keep on murdering, and our biggest concern is protecting ourselves from the legal system, not trying to figure out how to stay safe. After a minute, Luna joined me.

“I promise that not all Victory Tours are like this,” she said to me.

I almost told her that it was the best part of the tour but had the good sense to keep my mouth shut. Instead I unpaused my game and continued with the quest I was working on. We sat there for several hours, with Luna and I occasionally chatting about the game and what was happening and the different characters. However, the train eventually came to a stop at a station, and the Peacekeepers came on board and started a whole new investigation.

This time, however, things were far more serious. Everyone was thoroughly checked for any signs of guilt—like we’d just stick an empty vial that had contained the poison right back into our pockets—and then we were questioned and escorted off the train individually. Then they searched the train one car at a time, digging through everything and tearing it apart. I worried the entire time for this book, but Isabella came over to me and said, “Don’t stress about it. All the victors have secrets of some sort hidden in their rooms, so I’m sure a random notebook is the least of their issues when they’re searching for the murder weapon.”

At least, however, we were able to buy food and drinks at the restaurant at the train station, and we sat in the dining room watching the Peacekeepers come and go, carrying things off and on. There were other people at the train station, too, and they kept looking at us, but with such a heavy Peacekeeper presence, nobody dared to approach us. I ate well more than I needed to because I figured who knew when we’d be getting another meal on the train. And then I bought some snacks just for the heck of it. Nobody stopped me.

When they let us back on the train, I immediately headed for my car to make sure everything was in order. But when I stepped inside my room, Luna was right behind me.

“Buddy system, remember?” she said.

“Oh yeah. I guess I forgot,” I replied, but I welcomed her into my car anyhow.

The room had definitely been torn apart. The Peacekeepers didn’t even try to put anything back in order. Blankets strewn everywhere, the mattress askew, the closet door opened and various articles of clothing scattered on the ground. It was worse than when everyone had searched my room for secret snacks.

“What’s this?” Luna asked. I turned around to see her holding this notebook.

“That’s mine,” I snapped as I lunged forward and grabbed it from her hands.

She looked rather startled but held her hands up in the air in defeat. “I won’t read it,” she said. “But I can’t guarantee that the Peacekeepers didn’t go through it.”

I clutched the book to my chest. It didn’t matter if they looked through it or not. It would take longer than a couple of hours to decode this book and read anything worthwhile.

Now I had to find a brand new hiding place because even though the Peacekeepers were gone and nobody else knew where I hid it, it seemed tainted somehow. I glanced around the room at the general chaos.

“We’ll have to share a room,” Luna said then. She crossed her arms over her chest. “I doubt my room is any better than this one. Would you prefer if we stayed here?”

“Yes, please,” I said to her. I let out a breath, and the tension in my shoulders loosened slightly. At least I wouldn’t be thrust into another unfamiliar place, even if I have somebody who I’m not _that_ comfortable with sharing my bedroom. I definitely would have preferred Isabella, but I also know that Isabella probably wouldn’t have been happy to sit around and play videogames all day, and then I wouldn’t have been happy to do whatever she does all day.

So we went to Luna’s room, and I helped her gather up her bedding and blankets while she grabbed a few articles of clothing, and then we returned to my room and straightened it out enough so that it was now livable again. Luna insisted I stay in the bed (not that I was protesting) and she made her own place on the floor. I feel kind of bad because she’s old and probably has arthritis or something, but not bad enough to have switched places with her.

I’m writing now, and Luna has headphones on and is listening to music. I’m not sure what we’re going to do for food, or how we’re going to proceed with the Victory Tour without a stylist and just a bunch of scared prep team members, but I guess it’ll be exciting one way or another.


	17. Chapter 17

**_The Train en route to District 7_ **

Second day of travelling. They give us MREs to eat, just like we are in the arena. There’re tons of them, and they’re stacked up in rows according to what’s inside so that we can have breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Of course, this gives everyone an absolutely challenging problem: How do they possibly keep me from eating way too many calories every day? The prep team members are torn about which is the greater issue, the death of the stylist or the fact that I’m going to get fatter.

When I open my MRE—everybody has to check their own package for any evidence of tampering, and then we have to be the ones to break the seal—Luna or Europa (if she’s around) then lets me choose a few items from the meal and the rest are locked away. I find that I don’t care quite as much as long as I get to play my videogame, and that seems to satisfy everyone fine enough.

But in order to actually use the flameless heater, we have to take the package onto one of the outdoor balconies on the train—of which there are only a few—and huddle in the wind and cook our meals. We probably look completely ridiculous taking turns to crouch out on the balcony with the little MRE in front of us as we watch the meal warm up before our eyes. It makes me laugh every time.

It’s funny to see people’s reactions to this situation, too.

Isabella doesn’t find the song and dance we do to avoid potential poison as very funny, and I suppose she wouldn’t since Europa once made her eat my food to check for poison. Hammer and Isolde are a little on edge about it, too, because they were there and had to rescue her from the situation. And Europa, of course, never thinks anything like this is funny, so she’s pretty much stern about it all and bosses me around every chance she gets.

But Cronus and Jericho sit around snickering and muttering about how they never thought they’d have to do this again, and that these things taste far better than what they give the tributes, and maybe even better than some of the stuff they’ve been served at parties in the Capitol. Luna seems to find the MREs very entertaining. She says that they weren’t included in the Hunger Games as heavily when she was a tribute and young victor as they are now.

“Why?” I asked her as we moved our now-cooked lunches back into the train so that others could use our space to heat up their meals. “MREs are such a staple.”

“Yeah, that’s true,” she said. “I think it’s because people are used to eating more now, so they want to make sure that the Hunger Games last a little longer and the non-Career tributes don’t drop dead of starvation because they’re not used to going without meals and don’t have access to the Cornucopia like the Careers.”

“But you weren’t a tribute _that_ long ago,” I pointed out. “It’s not like you were fresh out of the Dark Days.”

“Sure, but it took awhile for them to catch on,” she explained. “There were several Hunger Games that were very short solely because many of the tributes didn’t have the skills to find food in the arena. They didn’t starve, but they were weakened to the point where they were picked off easily enough.”

Most Careers aren’t like my sisters and me. They weren’t trained at the same level of intensity as we were. I listened to kids talk in school about how they had to run “three whole miles!” like it was a major deal. Meanwhile, I was running ten miles every morning with a weighted vest for extra challenge as just part of my regular routine. I took very basic classes in school so that I didn’t have to worry much about homework. While other kids were complaining about assignments, or playing sports, or attending their weaponry clubs, or going shopping with friends, I returned home every day in order to hone my skills either with my trainer or with my sisters. And then when my sisters both won, it was just me by myself sometimes, but it never even occurred to me that I could sneak off and do something else. Isabella tells me that we weren’t alone in our lifestyle, even if it felt like nobody else in the world worked as hard as we did. (That was a point of pride, might I add. It meant that we were better than all the rest. Definitely victor material.)

“You okay, Avalon?” Luna asked, and then I realized that I was reminiscing about my childhood.

I nodded. “Yeah. Just thinking about the Hunger Games.”

“You do that a lot?” she asked.

“Yes. Don’t you?” I answered.

But I saw that she was watching me with concern, her brows furrowed and her lips drawn tight. I probably said something wrong, so I turned back to my food and started to shovel in the meal without really tasting it. Luna started to say something, but I was afraid that she would tell me to slow down and I wasn’t really in the mood to be criticized, so I walked faster until we were in the game car.

There is at least one Peacekeeper—usually two—in every non-bedroom car. But they don’t bother us much, and I found my spot on the beanbag and turned on the console and television. Luna joined me shortly afterwards, but she didn’t say anything about our conversation or the fact that I had already scarfed down half the pasta before I had even sat down. The game drew me in immediately, and I almost forgot to eat my lunch at all.

But now that I’m here writing, I wonder if I think about the Hunger Games too much. Obviously right now I’m on the Victory Tour, so it’s hard not to think about the Hunger Games, and the random murders really aren’t helping things. But just in general. I guess it’s hard not to think about it since so much of my life has revolved around it.

The rest of the day was pretty mundane. Luna and I played the game—well, I did, but she sat with me the whole time and didn’t say anything about me hogging the console, which is more than either of my sisters would do—until dinner, and then we had more MREs that we heated up, except this time all of us victors and the staff sat together in the dining room. The table has been cleared away, as had the rug, so we just sat on the bare floor like animals and ate out of bags. Not quite how I expected my Victory Tour to go, but what can you do?


	18. Chapter 18

**_The Train en route to District 7_ **

Someone has been murdered YET AGAIN. Who the hell is even doing this?

Anyway, the new dead person is Bobby, one of the prep team members. Cynthia and Flamingo (not her real name, I hope, but that’s what she calls herself) are beside themselves and won’t stop sobbing, so they’re huddled away in one of their bedrooms refusing the help of anyone else. As soon as I heard the news, the only thing I could think was that I hoped that Bobby wasn’t killed in the game room because I would hate to lose access to the videogame which is an absolutely wretched thing to think, and then I felt guilty that I wasn’t sadder that Bobby died. They found him in his bedroom. Well, except for his head. That was in his bathroom. Gross.

So we’re stopping at the next station we find, and then we’ll get even more Peacekeepers than we have, and there will be more questioning, and more swapping out of blood-soaked furniture (or maybe they’ll take his entire car this time because it’s not like he needs it anymore), and then we’ll just keep on rolling because there’s a Victory Tour to complete.

This is my first time glimpsing District 7, and it’s just crazy. Trees everywhere. Everywhere. I’ve never seen so many trees in my life, and it’s not like District 1 doesn’t have its fair share. Sometimes the train passes great stretches of land where all the trees have been cut down, leaving a barren, scarred earth behind. But then there are some of these areas where people are actively replanting trees. The circle of life. Which is definitely different from what’s happening here in this train; it’s more of a trapezoid of death.

Luna and I are practically attached at the hip. She does her duties well and doesn’t let me out of sight except when one or the other of us has to go to the bathroom or shower, in which case the other party remains in my bedroom. It only makes me wonder, though, if Luna could sneak out while I’m showering to murder somebody. Not that I think she did it, but it _is_ a flaw in the plan.

The train is slowing down, so it’s now time for more questioning.

**_District 7 Victor Village_ **

The entire train is being investigated, so everybody was kicked out. Cynthia and Flamingo insisted on having police protection and have been taken to what they said will be a “safe house.” It’s a bit dramatic on their part, but I suppose a couple of their colleagues have died, and it’s not like they personally have experienced death before. The rest of us victors ended up at District 7’s victor village.

Next to the Career districts, I think District 7 has the most living victors. They have quite a few: Juniper (140th), Elm (130th), Pitch (125th), Vesa (120th), Bristlecone (105th), and Liberty (80th). Though Liberty is on her last legs, I think, so who knows how much longer she will be around. Anyhow, she did invite us all to stay at her mansion, which is super nice of her because there are so many of us. For the first time in several days, I was able to leave Luna’s side and move around on my own.

Because of the most recent murder, I won’t be giving my speech tonight as planned but tomorrow. So the victors here have the job of keeping us entertained until then.

Once I was settled into my room—a great big suite with a four-poster bed and a giant wardrobe and a bathroom attached—I went downstairs to meet up with the others. Then there were introductions and all of the victors greeted me, and it’s pretty impressive that they have so many of them. Liberty ordered food of some sort so that nobody had to “futz around in the kitchen” and then people sat down in this big sitting room and started catching up on things. There was too much going on and too many conversations happening at once to record it all here in my book, but it was mostly about life and how people were doing and whether certain projects/hobbies/etc. were still going as planned.

Isolde, being the amiable person she is, is friends with Juniper and Juniper is married to Pitch, so the three of them and Hammer were going on about Isolde’s photography and how life is in the Capitol, and that Isolde might want to go back to school for a master’s degree in something or another. My sisters and Jericho were chatting with Elm and Vesa, but everything was pretty polite and standard. I don’t think they all know each other that well, but well enough that they could hold conversations and pass the time. Then all the older people were talking with each other with more familiarity.

I probably could have joined into one of the conversations without a problem, but I kept staring at this weird doll that Liberty had propped up in a chair in the corner of the room because it kept trying to talk to me. I don’t know how I knew because it wasn’t opening its mouth, but I could hear it just clear as day in my head like it was using telepathy to connect with me. So I finally went over and stared at it for a bit and then picked it up and turned it over in my hands.

“What do you want?” I whispered to it quietly enough that others wouldn’t hear me. It looked just like a standard doll with a porcelain face and ruffled dress.

_Kill everyone and move on._

“Oh. No thank you,” I said. “I’d rather not.”

_You don’t want to be on this Victory Tour anymore. You won’t have to be if they’re all dead._

“I know, but I really think no one else should die,” I explained. “It’s really quite an inconvenience, and there’s no need for it to happen anyhow. They’re nice people, even if they say some mean thing sometimes.”

Then, from behind me, I heard somebody say: “Is she okay?”

And more voices:

“Avalon? Is everything alright?”

“Liberty, why the hell do you have that creepy doll anyhow?”

“It was a gift from my friend’s granddaughter. It keeps me company.”

“Avalon, why don’t you come back here.”

“We should have brought the videogame with us.”

Finally I felt a hand on my shoulder. Isabella. She took the doll out of my hand and set it back where I had found it before she led me back to the others. She guided me into my spot on the couch and pressed my shoulder gently until I sat down on the cushions. But it didn’t get the doll out of my mind, or make me forget about the things that it said. Why would it tell me to kill people? It’s not like I was the one who was killing everyone.

And then, suddenly, I realized that maybe I _am_ the one killing everybody.

“Avalon? Are you okay?”

I looked up at Isolde. “What if . . . what if I’m the one killing everybody?” I whispered.

She smiled at me. “You’re not,” she said.

“But what if—”

“Avalon, you’re not the one killing everybody,” Europa said. “It’s Dr. Newell.”

Wait, what?

“Dr. Newell. . . .” But how? _Why?_ And why wasn’t anyone doing anything about it? I looked around at the group of victors, all of whom had abandoned their conversations and were looking at the exchange between Isolde, Europa, and me. How could everyone sit here so calmly when the doctor who was supposed to be helping me was actually running around murdering innocent people? Were we all so messed up from our time in the arena?

“It’s what we were just discussing,” Isolde explained. “I guess you weren’t paying attention.”

“No, I was too busy listening to a doll tell me to kill everyone,” I said.

That got me some good stares from the District 7 victors. Woops. I guess that’s not a normal thing for victors to say.

Europa cleared her throat. “The Victory Tour has been a little hard on her,” she explained simply.

Liberty chuckled, but turned it into a cough. The others glanced at her briefly as she waved away their concern with a gesture, and then their attention turned back to me. The crazy victor of District 1. The Career who didn’t want to go to the Hunger Games. They wanted more of an explanation than what Europa said, but my sister wasn’t going to give anymore, and I wouldn’t even know where to begin.

“We figured it had to be somebody who had access to override the security cameras,” Jericho explained. “But it wasn’t until me and Cronus saw him leaving Bobby’s bedroom that we were certain that it was him.”

“And he didn’t have another reason to be there, such as a therapy session?” Pitch asked.

“Well, he was carrying a bloodstained machete—which he immediately threw out the window—and he was covered in blood,” Cronus added.

“But why?” I asked. “I thought he was supposed to help me. I mean, he’s not, of course, but I thought that was the reason that he was here.”

“We’re not certain,” Isolde said. “That’s what we’re trying to figure out.”

Then they started talking about the murders and how Dr. Newell could have killed each and every one of the people who died. Bristlecone explained how it would be easy for the doctor—or anyone who knew what they were doing—to mess with the security footage, especially if they had support from the Capitol. The Peacekeepers rushed on board so fast that they could have destroyed any footage that Dr. Newell had forgotten to cover up, thus leaving no trace of evidence on the cameras.

“So I just want to get one thing straight,” I butt into the conversation. “We’re all okay with this? Like no one is talking about calling the Peacekeepers on him, or how best to kick him off the train while it’s moving.”

“If there is no evidence and there are only eyewitness accounts, it might not hold up,” Europa said.

Now Juniper stepped in and said, “Which means he’s just going to keep killing people.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “What if we caught him in the act? Then no one would doubt us and—”

“If Dr. Newell has the Capitol’s support, it doesn’t matter if we catch him in the act,” Europa interrupted me. “And if they are supporting him like this, then they’ll just throw out any evidence we find.”

Of course I know this. Isn’t that what happened to me? I killed Mom and Dad, but it was labelled a murder-suicide even though there was no way on earth one of them could have pulled that off. The evidence was destroyed, and anything that pointed to me as the murderer was brushed away. How is this different? It’s not, except that he might have been told to do it.

“Then can we at least warn the others?” I tried meekly.

Nobody had an answer for that. Or maybe they did because they continued talking but I couldn’t hear them over the sound of the doll begging me to come back to her and that she would lead me to a real good knife—the best knife I’d ever seen—and I could finish what Dr. Newell started and be done with everything. I eventually wandered away from the room altogether, but the voice didn’t leave me alone and eventually I just told it to shut its mouth. It laughed at that and vanished for a while.

Time for dessert! I’ll be back to write more later, maybe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for the ridiculous number of characters in this chapter.


	19. Chapter 19

**_District 7 Victor Village_ **

The other thing I wanted to write was this conversation I overheard in the evening after we had finished dinner and people had started to scatter throughout the house or return to their victor mansions. It involved my sisters, Isolde, Hammer, Pitch, and Juniper, and it went something like this:

Pitch: “How is she doing?”

Europa: “Fine. Just tired and stressed. The murders have been a bit taxing on everyone.”

Isolde: “She’s a little more than stressed, Europa.”

Europa (with irritation): “She’ll be _fine_ , Isolde. She’s a Vitner. She’ll deal.”

Hammer: “Cut the crap. She’s not fine.” Then he paused and continued, no longer talking directly to my sister. “She keeps hallucinating. Really disturbing stuff. It doesn’t seem to bother her, but it sure freaks everyone else out.”

Europa: “As I said—”

Hammer: “It’s not _normal_ , Europa!”

Isolde: “She sees the tributes she’s killed whenever she gives a speech. She hallucinates blood and guts whenever she’s at one of the dinners. She’s been hoarding food and eating until she’s sick. And now dolls are telling her to murder people. She might still be smiling—if you can even call it that—but she’s far from being fine. She may be able to hold on for the remainder of the Victory Tour, but I’m afraid. . . . I’m just afraid that she’s not going to make it.”

Pitch: “Do they have a backup plan? In case she is no longer presentable?”

Isolde: “No, they haven’t said anything about it.”

Pitch: “She’s with Dr. Castillo, right? Is there a way to get someone from her staff on board?”

Isolde: “We tried. That’s when they sent Dr. Newell instead.”

Hammer: “And now they’re sending replacements for the people who were killed. We don’t know for certain, but Isolde and I have some thoughts on that.”

Juniper: “That they’re filling the vacant positions with this asshole’s lackeys?”

Hammer: “Something to that effect. The only thing we can’t figure out is _why_.”

So they started throwing around ideas but I got bored of eavesdropping and wandered off through Liberty’s house. But crazily enough, I found myself back with the doll—yet in a completely different room of the house.

“You can walk?” I asked it as I crept closer to where it sat on the edge of a bed.

_Of course I can. I have legs, don’t I?_

“But you’re not alive,” I said. “You need to have muscles and nerves and bones and such in order to move like that.”

_It would be the same for speech, and yet I can speak._

“Yeah, but that might actually just be me going crazy,” I explained to the doll as I leaned over and picked it up. “I might just be hallucinating this again. And anyway, you’re not opening your mouth when you talk, so it’s not like you need muscles for that.”

_Does it matter? Let me tell you where to find the knife._

“Can’t we have a normal conversation? I’m so tired talking about all the murders.” I walked the doll out of the room and into the hallway as we talked. Now that everyone was doing their own thing, the house was eerie and surreal. Like our mansions in District 1, this one was far too big for one person—even one family—to live in, and the dozen or so people who were here were swallowed up in the depths. Or maybe it was me, and I had entered an alternate dimension.

_But you want to talk about the murders. They’re the best thing that’s happened to you on this trip. You think so, yes?_

“I wouldn’t put it like that,” I started. Hearing my own thoughts echoed back at me made me uncomfortable. She was going through my mind and the things she dug up weren’t pretty. It’s a good thing that her words only appeared inside my brain and weren’t really spoken aloud for everyone to hear.

_You could make it better._

“Really, you’re being ridiculous,” I scoffed.

_And yet you picked me up and brought me with you._

“Yes, well. I guess I got bored.”

As I’m writing this, I have to admit that if I wasn’t crazy before, I sure am now given the fact that I was just hanging out with this doll that was trying to convince me to kill people. It’s a good thing that this notebook is coded so everyone doesn’t find out how ridiculous I am because then I took the doll into my bedroom and propped her up on a shelf near my bed. She watches me as I write, but so far she’s been quiet like somehow she knows that putting things down in this book is good for me. Tonight when I go to sleep, I’ll stick her in the bathroom or the closet just so that she’s not watching me.

**_District 7 Victor Village_ **

I slept remarkably well last night. I’ve only been awake for a few minutes, but I cannot find the doll. I’ve searched everywhere in my bedroom and bathroom, and I’ve torn apart closets that I’m probably not supposed to go into. It’s nowhere to be seen. Oh, I really hope Liberty isn’t going to be too pissed that I’ve managed to lose her doll.


	20. Chapter 20

**_District 7 Victor Village_ **

Did you know that dolls don’t move on their own?

This morning at breakfast I found out that not only did the doll not move on its own, but _I_ was the one who moved it. Who knew! Well, apparently half the people here.

When I came down the stairs, I could hear a bit of commotion, so I tiptoed carefully into the dining room where everyone had gathered. Liberty must’ve been up since before dawn because there was a ridiculous amount of food: pancakes and eggs, sausage and bacon, fruit and oatmeal, juices and jams and syrups and teas and coffee. Large of amounts of it all. Everything smelled so good that I almost burst into the dining room without a second thought, but I managed to hold back and listen for a moment.

I caught the tail end of the conversation:

Cronus: “I woke up with a doll in my bed. You’re going to tell me that’s not weird?”

Jericho (with jest): “Sounds like you sleep too deeply.”

But then the conversation ended when they noticed me. The usual group of District 1 and District 7 victors all mingled together, with the exception of a few who might still be sleeping or perhaps found better things to do. I pretended that they weren’t all suddenly silenced the moment I walked in and took my place in an empty chair between Isabella and Jericho.

Europa immediately stood up and began to put food on a plate for me. Even here in District 7 I don’t get the freedom to eat whatever I want, I guess. Or maybe I had eaten too much yesterday and she feared a repeat. Anyhow, I instructed her what I wanted and she determined the quantity, and then she set the plate down on the table in front of me.

But I was distinctly aware that the conversation that had been going on before I walked in had been permanently discontinued, at least while I was there. So I said,

“So why was the doll in Cronus’ bed?”

“That’s a great question, Avalon,” Cronus said. “I was hoping you’d have some insight into it.”

“Nope,” I replied.

“You were sleepwalking last night and babbling to the doll,” Europa said. Made me wonder if she was just spying on me all last night or something. I wonder if they take shifts watching me or something.

“At least she enjoys that old doll,” Liberty laughed. No one else looked amused, but I cracked a grin. I’m sure normal fifteen year olds don’t go around playing with dolls, but I can’t say that it bothers me too much. I hate dolls, so I don’t know why I’m fond of this one, especially because it—or my brain—is telling me weird things.

Luna cleared her throat and set down her mug of coffee. “I think it would be best if I stayed with Avalon for the remainder of the trip, both on and off the train,” she said. “Except during the speeches and dinners—those should proceed as before.”

People asked why, and Luna gave them vague answers but I secretly knew it was because she had found a way to keep me occupied. Not only occupied, but it kept my mind off eating, too. Not that everyone wants me glued to a television screen, but it’s better than wandering around the Murder Express trying to conjure up the ghost of the dead escort.

The District 7 victors took us on a hike after breakfast. I guess that’s what they do for fun. Well, except for Liberty who said she was too old for those sorts of things. The hike was nice, but I’m not sure that if I were having guests over for whatever reason that I’d take them out to the middle of some random forest as an entertaining event. Just goes to show you how weird some of these other districts are.

Anyhow, I’ve taken my shower and it’s almost time to meet the new escort, stylist, and prep team member that have been sent to us.

**_District 7 Victor Village_ **

These people are hilarious. The escort is named Gerald, and he’s a weird looking man with beady eyes and tuffs of hair growing out of his ears. The stylist is Kleo, and she’s just nervous as can be. She keeps glancing around like the murderer could jump out of anywhere at any moment and kill her. And the prep team member is Carat who says very little and barely interacts with anyone.

So anyway, the three of them and the two remaining original prep team members have demanded that they get their own train away from the rest of us. But then the new people are scared that one of the old people are the murderers, so now they protest that they would have to share a train with Cynthia and Flamingo. I don’t know who is going to make the final decision, but I doubt that they’ll get their own train since it would be really weird to have two trains following right after each other for the Victory Tour, which is supposed to be the greatest honor and most wonderful thing in all of Panem.

It’s unfortunate that some of them—or maybe all—will end up dead and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. Anyone except for Dr. Newell, that is, and I don’t think he’ll stop just because one of us asks him to.


	21. Chapter 21

**_The Train, en route to District 6_ **

The speech went okay. I think I do better at the speeches then at the dinners anyhow. After all, I took speech lessons, but I never took lessons on how to eat a dinner with people who probably wanted me dead a few months ago. (I’m surprised, now that I look back on it, that Mom and Dad didn’t sign me up for those lessons, too.) So I did the speech and things were great, and then we went to dinner which was outdoors for some reason, but it was still really nice. It was cold, but fortunately Blue-Anna had created some fashionable yet warm dresses for my sisters and me before she died, and so we wore those and were all bundled up. It was nice to not be stuck in some stuffy room, and there were little lights on strings hung up along the wooden roof above our heads.

I heard the doll speak at one point and dismissed it because for some reason it’s easier to realize that that’s fake than it is to realize that anything else is fake. But as I was walking away from the dance floor, I saw a trail of blood in the snow and I thought that I needed to check it out because it was pretty damned suspicious. So I headed out away from the party and through the trees, and the laughter and music and voices disappeared behind me as I followed the trail. As the light dwindled, it became more challenging, but I managed to follow it to the base of a large tree.

But no sooner had I gotten there than I heard a voice behind me say, “Avalon? Are you okay?”

And it’s a good thing that Pitch has some quick reaction times because otherwise my knife would have been embedded in his throat. He blocked my attack, threw me to the ground, and twisted the knife from my hands.

“Where did you even get this?” he demanded as he knelt next to me and tucked the knife into his belt.

“She told me where to find it,” I sputtered, my face half-planted in the cold snow.

Pitch grunted but helped me to my feet. I tried to brush off the snow but it was pretty much embedded in my fur collar, and the hair on the side of my head was wet.

“Okay, yeah, they need to come up with a better plan,” he muttered to himself. He looked at me like he just didn’t know how to handle me, and in hindsight, I can’t say that I blame him. I don’t know how to handle me myself. If I have trouble telling reality from fantasy, and I somehow got hold of a knife (more about that in a bit) which I was willing to use against anyone who approached me, then how the hell could anybody be safe from me?

But before he could make a decision on how to proceed from here, there was another voice, and Juniper, the newest District 7 victor, came along the blood trail out of the shadows.

“Pitch? Everything okay?” she asked.

So I say “newest” District 7 victor, but she won the 140th, so she’s been around a few years, I guess. She caught the eye of many in District 1 when she won, but I think the thing that stands out the most for me is that she and Pitch got married the year that Europa won, and Europa was able to go to the bachelorette party. How cool is that to be a new victor and get invited to the first victor-victor marriage in recent history? She had to leave and come home before the actual wedding, but still, it was quite the honor. (And all I got was locked up in a psych ward when I won. Some victors get all the luck.)

“I think we might need some help here,” he said to her. “Any way you can go discretely get Isolde?”

“Isolde? You don’t want Europa? She’s my mentor,” I said.

“No, I think we should get Isolde first,” he answered me. But then he looked at Juniper and said, “But if Europa is available, get her, too. Not if it causes too much attention.”

Juniper nodded and disappeared back into the darkness of the trees, leaving me with Pitch. I eyed the knife in his belt. When I looked back up at him, he was studying me carefully. No way was he going to let me snatch the knife back. Not that I really wanted to, but there was something in me—some sort of pride or something—that made me want to grab it back from him since he had disarmed me, just to show that I couldn’t be counted out.

 _Not everything is the Hunger Games,_ I had to remind myself.

Pitch motioned towards a fallen log, and the two of us sat down on it. He was careful not to sit too close to me and to keep the knife on the opposite side of him. I thought he might give me a lecture on how all of us victors are in it together, but all he said was, “So a talking doll, huh?”

I laughed. He stared at me like he wasn’t expecting that sort of reaction.

“Only since visiting Liberty’s house,” I explained to him. “Before that it was all just blood on walls and dead bodies everywhere. I’m going to guess that you don’t see the blood in the snow here.” I pointed towards our footprints. I could see the blood perfectly well, smashed down in the snow underneath his larger footprints. I had kept to the side so that I wouldn’t disturb the trail.

“Is that what brought you out here?” he asked. He shook his head. “Most people would run the opposite direction if they started hallucinating blood and hearing doll voices.”

“Most people don’t kill nine kids in the arena,” I pointed out with a shrug. “Or kill their own parents. Ohhhh actually you’re not supposed to know that, so please don’t say anything because that was kind of stupid of me to say.”

Now he laughed, and it was my turn to be shocked. “You don’t have to worry about me saying anything of the sort,” he said. “Dr. Castillo working out well for you?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I like her,” I said. “Definitely nothing like Dr. Newell whose presence on the Murder Express grows less and less welcomed by the day.”

“Dr. Castillo’s a good person,” he said. “I’m glad that she’s able to help you out.”

“Obviously not enough if I’m hallucinating things like this,” I stated. “And I also tried to kill you. You’re pretty chill about that, by the way.”

“How did you get the knife anyhow?” he asked. Completely not phased that he almost died. Like this was just how life went for him and he frequently got knifed in the woods.

“The doll told me where it was,” I answered. “At Liberty’s house. I guess you should give it back to her since it’s hers. But I have to say I had to work pretty hard to hide it from everyone in the many wardrobe changes I’ve had since then. Then again, half the team was dead and the replacements are already freaking out that they’re going to die—which I guess they will since the murderer can’t be stopped—so people weren’t really focusing super well.”

“I’ll make sure it gets back to her,” he said. “And as far as what’s going on at the so-called ‘Murder Express’ . . .” But he didn’t get to finish because at that point, Europa, Isolde, and Juniper came through the trees and into the little clearing where Pitch and I sat.

“What’s going on?” Europa demanded as she honed in on us.

“I found her wandering off through the woods,” Pitch explained.

Europa immediately went on the defense: “Thank you for finding her, but we’re fine, and she doesn’t need to be babysat—”

“She was following a non-existent blood trail,” Pitch interrupted her before she could get too far into her insistence that she had everything under control. Because obviously she doesn’t, and at this point, the only person she is fooling is herself. “These woods are massive, and it’s very easy to get lost in them, especially if snowfall covers the tracks she made to get out here.”

“She can take care of herself,” Europa said, standing upright and staring him down. “She has been in woods and knows how to—”

“Europa, I almost killed him,” I said.

She turned and looked at me with a mixture of horror and disbelief. I smiled back at her.

But no one else was smiling. Juniper was glaring at me and Isolde’s eyes were wide and she had a finger pressed against her lips as though she were on the verge of saying something but had to hold it back for a moment longer.

Pitch pulled the knife out of her belt. “She says she got this from Liberty’s house,” he said.

“But Liberty put all her sharp objects away,” Isolde insisted. “She promised me that she would.”

“Must’ve missed one,” Pitch answered with a shrug. He tucked the knife back into his belt, careful to position it so that he wouldn’t stab himself on accident. Nice to know that everyone tried to clear the house of knives before I came over. It’s a little annoying to know that no one trusts me, but then again, I did try to kill somebody, so maybe it’s only fitting.

“Avalon. . . .” Europa started. But she couldn’t finish her thought.

In the silence the followed, Isolde managed to say, “So what do we do? The Capitol has given us a doctor that is killing all the staff, and Avalon obviously needs help.”

She looked down at me with such great sadness that I had to turn away. To know that I caused the ever-smiling Isolde that sort of hurt. . . . But I guess that’s what I do, don’t I? Constantly hurting people. Tributes, their families, Mom and Dad, us. Everybody. Suddenly I felt very cold sitting there, like maybe the snow on the fur collar had melted and started to run down my neck, even though I felt nothing of the sort. I hugged my arms around me and hunched down.

“We’ll be back in the Capitol soon enough,” Europa muttered, but even she was losing her confidence in the situation. “We’re about halfway through. It won’t be much longer.”

“Europa, this isn’t something that can be ignored,” Pitch said to her. “She needs help. Either she’s going to get blamed for the murders, or she’s going to actually kill someone herself.”

This wasn’t news Europa wanted to hear. Neither did I, but I kind of already knew it even if I didn’t put it into words quite like that. I watched my sister lean against the trunk of a tree whose branches had been cut away. She let out a breath.

Europa doesn’t like to admit that she’s wrong, nor does she like to admit that there’s anything wrong with, well, anything that surrounds her. In that case, it’s me. I’m her victor and her little sister, and to admit that I have problems that need to be addressed which she has been ignoring probably is pretty hard for her to digest.

But that only placed us back at the beginning: What do we do?

“I’ll make some phone calls and see what I can come up with,” Pitch said at last when it was clear that nobody had any suggestions to offer.

“Do you hallucinate all the time?” Juniper asked.

“No, only usually during the speeches and the dinners, and sometimes after,” I said. “Unless I’m not aware that I’m hallucinating, in which case I don’t know. But, you know, I don’t know. Maybe I’m getting worse because . . . the doll . . . that was new.”

“Everybody is on the buddy system now because of the murders, so she doesn’t leave Luna’s sight,” Isolde said. “Luna hasn’t mentioned anything weird.”

Between the five of us, we had no solution. We don’t have any experience in dealing with this sort of crap; that’s why we need professionals. Like actual professionals, not the sort who want to kill people for funsies. And here we sorry lot just stood there in the cold and stared blankly at each other like somebody would suddenly have a fantastic idea pop out of absolutely nowhere.

At last Isolde said, “We should be getting back. It’s pretty late, and I’m sure everyone’s wondered where we went.”

Juniper glanced down the trail for a moment, then turned back to us and said, “I’ll show you guys a different route. We can say that we took a walk.”

So I stood up and we followed after Juniper through the woods. Every now and again I glanced towards the knife on Pitch’s hip, but he made sure to keep his distance. Not too distant, but distant enough so that he could react if I lunged at him. I hated not being trusted, but I also couldn’t blame him. We trudged through the snow, leaving great big trail carved through behind us.

When we got back to civilization, it turned out that we hadn’t been missed _too_ badly because there had been so many people there that everybody assumed I was with someone else. Nice to know that they were concerned about me. It’s probably a good thing that Pitch had his eye on me, otherwise I’d be out freezing to death in the snow somewhere. Anyhow, we got back onto the train, and the new staff members reluctantly came with us. My suspicions were confirmed: there was no second train for them. However, they have divided the train into sections so that the new people cannot access our section of the train and we cannot access theirs without going by a sizeable hoard of Peacekeepers. We’ll see how long it keeps them safe.


	22. Chapter 22

**_The Train en route to District 6_ **

We still eat out of MREs, which doesn’t bother me the slightest. I can tell that Cynthia and Flamingo grow weary of this sort of eating now that the novelty has worn off, and they won’t stop talking about how much they look forward to the dinner in District 6. I don’t. The District 6 male is the first person I killed.

Another flaw in this buddy system master plan: I could very easily slip out of my room while Luna is sleeping. Not that I will, even if she made me put the doll in the hallway when it’s time to sleep.

(Luna: “Did you really steal Liberty’s doll? It has sentimental value to her. We need to send it back.”)

However, the doll comes with us whenever it’s time to play videogames, and I know that it drives everyone mad, but I just can’t seem to leave it behind. Now it doesn’t say quite as many scary things like it did. In fact, I haven’t “heard” it talk since we got on the train, so it’s just a regular doll again and not a vessel for demons.

The new stylist, Kleo, barely knows what she’s doing, and she’s constantly distracted because she’s looking over her shoulders at everything. I preferred not having a stylist at all rather than working with her. (Not that I want her to die, Dr. Newell if you’re ever reading this, so please don’t kill her just because of that. Actually, don’t kill her at all.) Kleo has very strong words to say when I don’t hold still _just_ the perfect way she wants, and I find that working with her taxes my patience more than it ought to. Plus she wanted me to take time out of my busy schedule today to try on every single dress and outfit for the remaining stops just to make sure I fit into them because she heard that I had gained weight since the trip started.

“Normally it’s the other way around,” she mumbled to herself as she measured my waist with a long yellow measuring tape. “Normally they lose weight on these sorts of things. Much easier to take in than to let out. Yes they are.”

“Wow, you’re rude,” I said.

She started and the tape slipped around my hips. She looked at me with her large eyes and then glanced around nervously, but there was no one else in the room beside Luna who was dozing with a book long-forgotten on her lap.

“I’m sorry,” she whimpered. Then she dropped her voice to barely over a whisper and added, “Please don’t kill me.”

I ripped the tape out of her hand and threw it to the floor.

“I am not a mindless murderer!” I snapped, and Luna nearly fell out of her chair with the sudden noise. “Treat me with more respect than that or get out of here and I’ll take care of my own dresses.”

Luna set her book to the side and took in the sight of me standing there with a trembling Kleo crouched down next to me, hands held up as though she still clutched the tape that now lay on the floor.

“What’s going on?” the older victor demanded.

“Sh-she—” Kleo started, but she couldn’t get any words out.

I rolled my eyes. “I am so tired of everyone telling me how fat I am!” I said. “And I made a comment, and then she thought that I was going to kill her! Which is completely ridiculous! Tell her, Luna.”

Luna looked back at the trembling woman.

“Kleo, get off the floor, you idiot,” she said. The stylist stared at her with surprise, and I have to admit that there was something so satisfactory in hearing Luna say this. “Avalon has been with me this entire time—as I told you—and she is not the murderer. As I told you. So do your job, or get off at the next train station.”

The satisfaction was slightly dampened by the fact that they had had conversations about me and whether or not I had killed those people. But at least it was clear that I wasn’t the culprit. Without waiting to be dismissed, I threw on my own clothes and stomped out of the car towards the game room which had now become the social hotspot. Luna followed on my heels.

“Can I just _not_ have a stylist?” I asked her knowing full well what the answer was.

“I can’t tell you how many times I wondered the same thing for myself, but that is part of a victor’s life,” the woman answered easily.

Once we got to the game car, we found the other victors talking about a new rumor that’s going around: the murderer’s name is Humphrey Riverton, and he lives under the floorboards of the dining car. He enjoys prowling for his next victim while everyone eats dinner, but he can be placated with classical piano music.

“Where in the seven hells did that come from?” Luna demanded.

“One of the crewmen on the train,” Isolde said, barely containing her laughter. “I’m so sorry, guys. I know it’s not appropriate, but it’s cracking me up.”

“Apparently one of the employees started the rumor, and then the staff members picked it up, and even some of the Peacekeepers are talking about it,” Jericho said.

“I even—I even—” Isolde had to pause here because she started cackling, and tears rolled down her cheeks. We waited for her to gather herself together and she continued, “I even heard Cynthia tell Flamingo that her friend told her _all about_ Humphrey Riverton before this trip started and warned her to be watchful for him.”

“This is absolutely absurd,” Luna sighed.

Absurd and hilarious. Europa and Isabella had sometimes mentioned Capitol rumors and how easy it was for them to travel. But as interesting as it was, the doll and I found our beanbags (she gets her own because I’m not that weird and obsessed and want to hold her all the time, eww) and I turned on the console. The others continued to talk about the esteemed Mr. Riverton and his infamy aboard the Murder Express.

When it came time for dinner, the staff was anxious about eating in the dining car, but we victors could barely keep straight faces as we watched them squirm and struggle to maintain their composure. Flamingo insisted that she bring her own rug to sit on so that Mr. Riverton couldn’t see up her dress or tickle the back of her legs while she ate. Cynthia provided piano music on a small music player. Kleo was near tears the entire time, and finally she threw down her uneaten MRE and ran out of the car back to her room.

I think I like Mr. Riverton. He seems like an interesting person, especially if he can freak out the staff like that.


	23. Chapter 23

**_The Train en route to District 6_ **

We’ll be at the station soon enough so that we can go to the speech and dinner. I only have a couple minutes before then, so I thought I’d write here to pass the time.

Kleo refused to perform her stylist duties today, so Isolde said that she could either get her shit together or get off in District 6. The stylist sniffled and said that she was under the weather but would be better in the future. The prep team members were pretty much useless because they were following whatever Kleo said. Anyhow, I was able to get into my dress by myself just fine with some help from Luna to manage the zippers and buttons.

Also, as of this afternoon at lunch, Mr. Riverton has a middle name: Cucumber. Humphrey Cucumber Riverton. Cynthia said that it was because he was born under a cucumber moon. I’m pretty sure that’s not a real thing.

**_The Train en route to District 5_ **

District 6 wasn’t dissimilar to District 8, though a bit more spread out and not nearly as colorful. There were some areas of greenery in parks and large planters and the like, but otherwise it was pretty boring. I’m so glad we weren’t expected to tour an automotive factory or something. It sounds so painfully boring. How could an entire district of people devote themselves to something as dull as transportation?

The speech was pretty run-of-the-mill. I’m getting used to them all, and I deliver every speech flawlessly. Thanks for the speech lessons, Mom and Dad. Now I can even give my speeches to the kids I’ve killed. What a neat skill, and something that every victor should be prepared to have! Then came dinner which was actually inside a train museum, so we sat inside of train cars.

Yes, okay, they put us in train cars after Dr. Newell slash Mr. Humphrey Cucumber Riverton has been offing everybody on our train.

The District 6 victors—Rikuto (139th), Falcon (113th), Savera (106th), and Zephyr (95th)—couldn’t quite see the same humor in the situation that we District 1 victors could. They probably thought we were all a little touched in the head if we could make jokes about whether Mr. Riverton had joined us for the evening after we explained who Mr. Riverton was. (Or, really, who he wasn’t.)

And maybe we are a little nuts. I mean, besides the “baseline” level of nuts. Like this whole people dying on the Victory Tour train thing has gone to our heads and we just have completely cracked. Even Europa grinned at the jokes. I think that if she finds this humorous, then we’re all officially completely off our rockers.

Many of the people there interpreted our humor for appreciation for the dinner, which is good enough.

But it wasn’t until I got back to Luna and my train car that I realized that I didn’t hallucinate once—not even once—when I was at dinner tonight. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to it, but I don’t care at this point. If I’m not trying to kill people or making some crazy upsetting scene, then it’s all good by me.

However, we didn’t have much time to contemplate the evening before there was more commotion in the hallway. Luna and I exchanged a look that pretty much said, “NOT AGAIN.”

But it was not so. Instead it was just Cynthia demanding to talk with me, and Europa telling her to go away, and Cynthia insisting that it was of utmost importance that we speak, and Europa informing the excited prep team member that she would kick her ass if she didn’t leave me alone. By that time, however, Cynthia realized I was there, and she came over and clasped my hands in hers.

“Avalon, my dear, I have the biggest favor to ask of you,” she said. Her hands were warm and clammy. A bit gross.

“Say no, Avalon,” Europa grumbled.

Isolde, who I hadn’t noticed at first, said, “Cynthia, leave her alone. She’s tired enough as it is.”

The prep tea member ignored her. She smiled at me and continued, “I hear you can speak with the dead.”

“Oh, only with people I’ve killed,” I said. “And I haven’t killed anybody on this train, so I can’t speak with them.”

Cynthia’s smile faltered. I don’t know if she was disappointed that I wasn’t able to help her, or upset that I had actually said that. Either way, I smiled at her because it was funny to see her reaction. And it’s not like I really _speak_ to the dead people, you know? We don’t have conversations or anything. That’s reserved for the doll.

“Alright, see? Now leave Avalon alone,” my sister snapped at Cynthia. She stepped forward as though she might physically pry Cynthia away from me and toss her into the next train car.

“Cynthia go to bed,” Isolde instructed her. “Everybody’s tired, and we need to get some sleep. Besides, if you’re really concerned about murders, then it’s better that you stay with Flamingo and lock your doors, okay?”

Cynthia’s hand left mine, and she turned around. “I don’t know who is doing this, but we need to find out before more people die,” she said to Europa and Isolde. “I hope you come to your senses soon enough before . . . before . . .” She burst into tears and hurried down the hallway and out the door.

Isolde and Europa exchanged looks. Obviously they weren’t big fans of Cynthia. She was grating on my nerves, too.

“She’s scared,” Luna said from behind me. “Three of her colleagues have died, and she’s worried about herself next.”

“As she should be,” Isolde said. “But she shouldn’t be harassing Avalon. This isn’t a game. Avalon—well—” She looked over at me. “You need to get as much rest as you can and not be bothered by people who think you can talk to dead people.”

I nodded. “Sure,” I said. And she was probably right. This entire trip has been quite stressing, and as exciting as the murder mystery is, it only adds to the chaos of the events.

“Why is this doll in the hallway?” Europa suddenly asked, scrambling back away from it as though she had just noticed it.

Luna sighed and said, “I can’t sleep in the same room as it, so it has to wait here til the morning.”

“Okay, that’s creepy as hell,” Europa said. “When we get to District 5, we’ll send it back to Liberty.”

Europa and Isolde said goodnight to us, and they headed back to Isolde’s room where they have been staying. I gave one last look at the doll before closing the bedroom door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story officially has more comments than views and it cracks me up for whatever reason. Maybe I'm just going insane. Perhaps, perhaps.


	24. Chapter 24

**_The Train en route to District 5_ **

Hey, guess what?

Okay, sure, I won’t make anyone guess.

Flamingo is missing.

(Bet you thought I was going to say that she’s dead, right? Well maybe she is, but we don’t know. I mean, at the rate things are going, it’s more than likely.)

She never returned to the room she and Cynthia share last night, and Cynthia went up and down the train asking everyone for her. She even knocked on our bedroom door well after we had turned out the lights and gone to sleep. This morning, the Peacekeepers decided to take the missing person report seriously, and they had everyone stay where they were and then they went through every single room and destroyed them once again to look for Flamingo as though she might be hiding in the half inch of space between my nightstand and bed, or maybe she had carved out a place within my mattress.

We were supposed to do the speech and dinner in District 5 tonight, but it’s been delayed once more because our train has been delayed, and they’re going to do a proper search once we get to the station in District 5 and can kick us all out so we won’t be in the way. Isabella said that once we’re in District 5, we can talk with Cassiopeia and see if she has any advice to help me. Honesty, I forgot all about my own problems in the midst of this mystery.

Cynthia won’t stop wailing because Flamingo is missing, and then we will sometimes get the briefest of breaks, only for her to start wailing again because now the newer staff members suspect that _she_ might be in league with Mr. Riverton. It’s difficult because she insists on being in the game room with the rest of us, but she does nothing but make noise while we are trying to relax as much as one can in this sort of situation.

And then

Hang on again.

Update: they found Flamingo’s scarf wrapped on the railing of one of the outside balconies.

I’m going to go wait with the others now that Cynthia has taken her wails elsewhere.

**_District 5 Victor Village_ **

Once the scarf was found, the Peacekeepers on the train connected with their Peacekeeper buddies elsewhere and a hovercraft was dispatched to check every inch of railroad track that we have covered between when Flamingo was last seen yesterday evening and when her scarf was found today. It didn’t take them long to find her body.

I wonder what everyone is thinking about how many times this Victory Tour has been delayed. Are they given a reason? Do people think it’s because of me? Or has the infamous Train of Death become a national murder mystery?

Once we arrived in District 5, we were hurried off the train and taken to victor village where we will be spending the night with the victors there. Things appear to be a little less amiable in this place than they were in either District 7 or District 10. There are five living victors in District 5: Cassiopeia (145th), James (136th), Elijah (133rd), Solar (114th), and Benjamin (79th). So far we have only seen the most recent three. Benjamin was invited over for dinner but never showed up, and Solar wasn’t invited at all though no one told me the reason. So we congregated at Cassiopeia’s house where her parents were super kind to us but Cassiopeia was really embarrassed for some reason. Half of us are staying here with her family, and the other half are going over to James’ place.

Cassiopeia led us into a sitting room and assured us that it wasn’t bugged, and then we filled the District 5 victors in on the goings on with the Murder Express (it’s a name that has now caught on) and the antics of one Mr. Humphrey Cucumber Riverton.

“What the fuck are you all smoking?” Elijah demanded once we had finished up the story and Isolde once again had to wipe the tears off her cheeks.

Cassiopeia and James stared at us, barely blinking.

They, like the victors of District 6, did not find the misadventures of the District 1 victors very funny. Not that it’s _actually_ funny, per se, but what else can you do but laugh when everyone’s dying for no damned good reason? (Okay, there are probably many other things you could do, so I guess that line of logic falls through pretty fast.)

James, likely trying to change the topic to something a little more normal, turned to me and said, “What’s with the doll, Avalon?”

In other words: Why the hell is a fifteen year old carrying around a doll?

“Oh, she tells me that I should start murdering people to help Mr. Riverton along,” I said with a shrug. “But don’t worry, I tell her that I won’t.”

A silence spread throughout the room. Uncomfortable only for the District 5 victors, I suppose; the rest of us are all used to it.

At last it was broken when Elijah said, “How soon can you guys get back on your train?”

“I have to thank everyone for letting me kill their children first,” I replied with perhaps a touch too much joviality. “Actually, wait, this is one of the few districts in which I didn’t kill the tributes.”

I wondered if Cassiopeia and James were regretting having us stay at their place, and if Elijah was grateful that none of us would be with him. No one said anything, and then at last Isabella stood up and said, “Cassiopeia, can you show me to the bathroom?”

“Um, sure,” the District 5 victor said. She shot me a quick, nervous look before she got to her feet and led my sister out of the room.

Once again: awkward silence. This time slightly more awkward for everyone, not just for District 5.

“So what’s actually going on?” Elijah dared to ask when it was clear that the tension wasn’t going to resolve itself.

“We have no idea why, but there is somebody on the train who is murdering the various staff members,” Isolde said, the humor evaporated. She rubbed her cheeks with the hem of her sweatshirt sleeve. “And it’s not funny, we know, but it’s so messed up that we don’t know what else to do.”

“Have you tried calling the police or Peacekeepers?” James asked cautiously.

“Can’t help when the person doing the murdering is affiliated with the Peacekeepers,” Jericho answered. “But I think that’s all we can say on the matter, if you don’t mind. The less you know, the better.”

“So four people have died so far and they keep bringing in new people rather than actually trying to figure out who the killer is?” Elijah confirmed. “Sounds like some Capitol bullshit to me.”

You know, it’s kind of funny that everybody seems to have this dour view of the Capitol because when I was younger—or, really, until very recently—I always thought that the Capitol was a magnificent place where magical things happened. Maybe not actually magical, but magical in the sense that all my dreams would come true once I had become a victor. But so far everyone has only said negative things. Not just negative: hopeless. Like there’s nothing here we can change, so we might as well continue on with the Victory Tour and let Dr. Newell keep murdering.

If you had asked the pre-Games me about it, I would have scoffed and told you that of _course_ we had to keep on with the Victory Tour because it is such a great honor. But now I’m wondering why they’re even bothering. Or at least, why aren’t they doing more to keep people alive? It seems like Dr. Newell has no desire to kill us victors, but he is eager to off the staff left and right. Why? This isn’t the Hunger Games. And anyway, they’re Capitol citizens and would never be in the Hunger Games to begin with.

I’m beginning to really see how strange the Capitol as a whole is. I’m understanding that the Hunger Games aren’t a tradition to remember the crimes of our ancestors.

But I’m really not getting why the hell people are dying on our train and why it’s allowed to continue.

Isolde and Jericho then explained to Elijah and James how we are using a buddy system to keep ourselves safe from being accused of murder. The good thing is that because we’re all Career victors, we understand the importance of commitment to our task, so nobody has tried to sneak away from his or her buddy or has protested being around the same person so much or anything like that.

Shortly thereafter, Cassiopeia’s dad stuck his head into the room and told us that dinner was ready and invited us into the dining room to eat. Cassiopeia and Isabella returned then—clearly this was not a simple bathroom tour—and the whole lot of us crammed into the table and ate a delicious meal of venison and sweet potatoes, among other things. They even had freshly-baked bread. Europa sat next to me the whole time and silently judged me on how much I was eating, but I pretended that I didn’t notice her at all. Besides, my appetite is the least of problems on this Victory Tour.

After dinner, we hung out for a bit and everyone just chatted and caught up or spent time watching cartoons on television. I don’t know a whole lot about District 5 or any of the victors aside from Cassiopeia. She goes to the university and has many of the same classes as Isabella, though not all the same because I think they’re studying different things. I was never in any of her classes because she’s a super genius and I’m, well, definitely not. I actually had to drop most of my classes because I couldn’t keep up. And it’s clear that Cassiopeia was a super genius well before the Hunger Games because the sitting room we ended up in was full of awards and certificates for her achievements. She caught me looking at them, and when I glanced at her, she gave me an embarrassed smile that quickly dropped away.

For dessert we had homemade pie. Elijah said his wife made it. I wonder if Elijah cooks since he’s blind and all. Actually, I wonder how most things go when people are blind. Maybe I’ll ask him one day, but not right now.


	25. Chapter 25

**_The Train en route to District 4  
_ **

This morning after a delicious breakfast (which Europa sadly regulated for me), we headed out for a District 5 activity. To my relief, we did not wander around the forests like in District 7 or take tours of the power plants. Instead we watched a soccer game.

Jericho and Hammer spent a good amount of time trying to explain the rules to my sisters and me. No surprise to anyone reading this notebook that I have never played soccer or any other sport for that matter, and I have no idea what the rules are. But Isabella lost interest when Cassiopeia pulled her away, and the two of them disconnected from our conversation and sat there chatting with each other.

You know what’s funny? It seems like everyone here has their victor friends. Europa and Isolde are friends, and Isolde is friends with Juniper and Esther and Hammer, and Isabella and Cassiopeia are friends, and Jericho and Cronus get along quite well, and the older victors all have each other. Even when we go and hang out with other victors, everyone speaks easily to each other—for the most part—and there are always things to talk about. I don’t have any friends, though, so maybe I should make some. Not right now because there’s too much going on, but I’d like to have friends, too. Like actual real friends, not ones that you have to break their limbs or kill.

Not that anyone here is unfriendly or doesn’t make me feel welcome, but I want more than that. Or is that selfish and I should just be grateful for what I have?

The game was really exciting and there were a few goals here and there and one team won, and then we headed out for lunch back at the victor village at Cassiopeia’s house again, and we hung around until it was time to get ready for the speech.

This time we were graced with the presence of the escort, Gerald, the stylist, Kleo, and the remaining prep team members, Cynthia and Carat. I say good on Cassiopeia’s parents for putting up with the lot of them because although they were initially polite, they were quite ill-tempered when it came to getting my sisters and me ready for the speech. Gerald did absolutely nothing useful, and Kleo muttered things under her breath that I couldn’t hear but were probably about my weight, and Cynthia kept asking me if maybe I’d reconsider helping her speak with the dead and I could possibly get in touch with Flamingo to apologize, and Carat stayed mostly out of the way which just kind of pissed the others off because they thought she wasn’t doing enough. Quite frankly, she’s my favorite so far because she was pretty quiet and only spoke when needed.

I don’t know why I bother saying that the speech went well every single time because, well, it went well. There’s nothing much more to say than that and it seems like a waste of words.

Then the dinner came and it was a nice sort of dinner with food and things. Again, pretty mundane. I’m really just rushing through this because I have to get to the next part which is what I really want to write about, okay, so just bear with me. District 5 did a nice job hosting us and we got to see the other two victors who hadn’t been at Cassiopeia’s house. Neither of them interacted with us very much. We’re probably too young for them or something. I’ve noticed that with victors: we tend to sort ourselves into age groups, roughly at least. Probably when I’m old, I’ll be familiar with the people who won games in the same decade as me and I’ll be less interested in socializing with the young whippersnappers.

After dinner, we got back on the train.

And then Cynthia roped me into a séance.

She said that we could use my doll as a conduit to speak with the ghosts because she had heard me speaking with the doll once and was absolutely convinced that I was talking with Blue-Anna. If she knew what the doll said, she’s probably reconsider.

Of course Europa said no to the séance, but Gerald and Kleo insisted, and even a Peacekeeper said that it was worth a shot. But Cynthia limited the number of people so that we wouldn’t have the entire group of victors, and then there was a bit of commotion to see which victor got to go.

Luna would be required to participate if I was because she’s my buddy.

Europa insisted that she be there because she’s my mentor, which meant that Isolde would also have to come.

Isabella wasn’t quite so eager and asked if she and Hammer could watch, but Cynthia told them that it was only open to those who participated or we might scare off the spirits.

Jericho and Cronus were eager to join in, but there wasn’t enough space and their “amusement” wasn’t enough to convince the staff that they were taking it seriously.

So in the end it was the following people: me, Luna, Europa, Isolde, Cynthia, Gerald, Kleo, an off-duty Peacekeeper named Timothy, and one of the crewmen named Spud. (Cynthia had to grill the crewman to make sure that he was a “believer” and not someone interested in spreading gossip to the rest of the train crew. Spud convinced her that he was terrified that the killings might touch himself and his coworkers.)

We went into the dining room because that was where Blue-Anna was found and where Mr. Riverton lived under the floorboards. Someone had put out a thick square rug in the center, so the nine of us sat in a circle with a candle in the middle and the doll in front of me. Then we had to turn off the lights, hold hands, close our eyes, and listen to Cynthia chant some words and ask Blue-Anna to come speak with us. If anyone even _dared_ to breathe too loudly, Cynthia would tell us to quiet. She did not tolerate any sort of unwarranted comment. I sat between her and Luna, and it was really, _really_ hard not to laugh the entire time.

“Blue-Anna, beloved stylist of District 1, we beg you to speak with us,” Cynthia whispered for the third time. “We have here for you your conduit so that you can make your presence known. Come to it now and show us a sign that you are with us.”

I slowly opened one eye to look around and almost lost it entirely. Most people had their eyes closed, but Gerald’s eyes were squeezed shut and he was mouthing words to himself like he was feverishly praying. Kleo was rocking back and forth crying. Isolde’s lips were clamped together as she tried to keep herself from laughing. Europa, eyes wide open, was glaring at Cynthia.

“I feel her here!” Cynthia said suddenly, and people gasped. The woman continued, “She’s with us! Please, Blue-Anna, speak with us! Let us help you!”

A few other people muttered things like “I feel her, too!” and “Oh, I can’t believe this!”

Then the candle flickered out and from somewhere within the car—but not within the group—there was a sudden and piercing scream that reverberated through us all. This caused various people within the group to start screaming, and Cynthia was wailing that we couldn’t break the circle and we all must continue to hold hands, and somebody started to cry and say that Humphrey Riverton was here, and then another person started screaming that they were hurt, and the entire thing dissolved into general chaos.

“Don’t break the circle! Whatever you do, don’t let go!” Cynthia cried out. “Blue-Anna! Come show us a sign!”

“Oh, this is ridiculous!” Europa yelled. More commotion, and then suddenly the lights flickered on. My sister stood with her hand on the switch and surveyed the lot of us. Then her eyes stopped. I followed her gaze.

Kleo was dead. She was slumped forward into the circle with a hole in the back of her head.

If there was chaos before, then I don’t know how to describe what happened next. Cynthia, Gerald, and Spud started screaming and wailing. They jumped to their feet and flailed about, while Timothy immediately grabbed onto his radio and called for backup Peacekeepers.

Luna grabbed my hand again and hauled me to my feet. I snatched up the doll and followed after her as we went to the other side of the dining car with Europa and Isolde. I found my attention drawn to Kleo’s body slumped face-first on the rug. Blood and brains clung to her hair, and there was more stuff on the rug in front of her. There was no sign of anybody else here who wasn’t in our séance group, but with the lights off and everyone in a panic, it wasn’t implausible that somebody had come in, fired a shot, and left. Especially if the gun was quiet. I’m not as well-versed in firearms as I am in other weapons, but I assume that a silencer would make things, well, silent. Or at least quieter than normal.

But then I glanced up and saw a window cracked open. Just a few inches. Enough for someone to fire through without needing to get in and out of the train. Then I pretended I didn’t see it because it’s not like the murderer was going to be stopped, so who cared if I saw vital evidence or not.

The Peacekeepers poured in, and the crime scene was assessed and we were escorted out to let them do their job. Then everybody was questioned. When we were released, we were told to go directly back to our rooms and stay there until the morning. Probably so that they could cover up Dr. Newell’s crimes, but it’s not like they’d tell us that. So Luna and I returned to our car and locked the door behind us.

“That was fun,” I said as I clutched the doll to my chest. “Who knew that séances could be so exciting?”

“Avalon. . . .” Luna started as she looked at me. But then she shook her head and said, “Go get ready for bed. We’ll get to sleep early tonight.”

I did as instructed and used my time in the bathroom to ponder why Dr. Newell wanted to kill his own spy, if that’s what Kleo was. Maybe she wasn’t a good spy because she certainly wasn’t a good stylist. But there went the thought that the replacement staff were working for Dr. Newell if he was okay offing one of them so easily.

Okay, I think Luna wants to actually go to bed tonight—she says she has a headache from all the stupidity—so I need to stop writing now and turn off the lights.


	26. Chapter 26

**_The Train en route to District 4_ **

We are supposedly getting new staff when we reach District 4: a new stylist plus two more prep team members. Why two when we already have Cynthia and Carat? Great question—one that they want answered, too, because now they’re terrified that it means that one or the other will die. That logic is a little strange if they think that Mr. Riverton is the one killing everyone off because how would the Capitol know to send an additional person if Mr. Riverton was the one doing the murdering?

“Avalon, I want to talk with you,” Luna said shortly before lunch. She probably should have waited until after I ate if she wanted a good conversation, but maybe then I’d be in too much of a food coma to be reasonable, so I said nothing as she led me back into our personal car.

We sat down on the bed and by the way she looked at me with not a single drop of humor in her eyes, I knew I was in for a serious discussion. By this point, I had spent enough time around Luna that we knew each other decently well. For example, I knew her favorite MREs and what she liked best out of them, I knew how long she took in the bathroom every morning, I knew that she talked to herself when she didn’t think I was listening, I knew that she had nightmares but didn’t want to let me know so she spent most of her nights awake, I knew that she woke up with back pain from sleeping on the floor but pretended that everything was fine. If you spend enough time around somebody, you learn these things.

“The Victory Tour is never easy for any victor, even for one who loves the Hunger Games,” she began. I watched her face as she spoke and wondered if this was rehearsed or the first time she was saying it. “The things we did in the arena—whether we can justify them or we think that they were unnecessary—affect us, sometimes in negative ways. And then when we are required to go on the Victory Tour, we’re still trying to figure out what we did and why we did it. . . . We have to face the families of the children we killed, and even the families of the kids we didn’t kill but still knew as our allies or our opponents. It’s hard to do, even for somebody who found their time in the arena to be beneficial, and it’s even harder when there are other, very serious things going on at the same time.”

“You mean the murders,” I said.

“Yes, I mean the murders,” she agreed. “They might break up the monotony of the train rides and the repetitiveness of visiting various districts, but they add stress, and they’re completely unnecessary and horrible.”

I nodded. “I think I understand,” I said. “But why are you telling me this?”

She let out a breath and glanced towards the doll propped up on the nightstand next to my bed.

“You spent several hours last night talking with your doll saying some very bizarre things,” she said. “I think that the stress of everything that’s going on is affecting you. . . . Not that I blame you. It’s affecting all of us.”

Me, talking with the doll in my sleep? I’ve heard weirder things, and I can’t say that I’m surprised. But I’m curious what she meant by “bizarre” because I have some ideas of what bizarre is and I’d like to know whether it matches up with what Luna thinks is bizarre. But she didn’t offer up any more information about it, and I didn’t ask because I started to think about what was going on and how the other victors were looking a little more worn and thinly spread.

“And then we go and talk with the other victors from different districts who think we’re all nuts,” I muttered.

Luna laughed at that. “Honestly, for as well as victors get along with each other, sometimes we in the Career districts are still considered a little ‘different’ from the rest of them,” she said. “But I suppose that telling them about our Mr. Riverton was a bit too much for them. Having fun on the Victory Tour is a strange concept, but having fun while there are active murders happening is definitely out there.”

“When we get to District 4, are we going to see the ocean?” I asked Luna.

“Avalon, you are a strange girl,” she said. “Yes, we’ll be seeing the ocean. But don’t think I can’t also see that you completely switch the topic whenever something tough comes up. We can’t ignore what’s happening around us, and we can’t make light of it, either.”

“Well there’s not much else we can do about the situation,” I point out. It goes without saying—because we can’t say it—that we can’t stop the murders from happening.

Luna smiles sadly. “Your sister said that Cassiopeia has lent you some books,” she said. “So why don’t we go find Isabella and get that sorted out.”

I raised an eyebrow. “I don’t want to read,” I said. “And it’s not like I’m going to concentrate well. Besides, if it’s from Cassiopeia, it’s probably something like anatomy or nuclear science or something.”

But I knew that this was what Isabella had talked to Cassiopeia about back in her victor mansion because wasn’t that also how they tried to distract me this entire last semester by making me try to learn things? When Luna stood up and walked to the door, I followed.

And this is something else I realize: we victors start figuring out each other’s thoughts so that we don’t need to speak to each other. You’re around somebody long enough that you begin to understand the words between their words. Dr. Castillo would be proud of me for putting this together and being able to read the unspoken things that people are saying. But I’m also very good at learning things that I need to learn to survive, and this is just another aspect of survival, isn’t it? We can’t say whatever we want when we need to say it, so we have to resort to trying to pick out the meanings of each other’s sentences.

In this case, the random transition between “this Victory Tour sucks” and “let’s go delve into some fine light reading from District 5” wasn’t quite as random as it seemed. Luna wanted me to do something other than sit around and guess who would be killed next or stress about when I’d next hallucinate or spend the entire night having a tea party with a cursed doll. So we went out of the room and into the hallway and wandered around until we found Isabella and Hammer. They were in the dining car—which had once again been cleaned up following yesterday’s failed séance—where they were eating their lunch a little early.

“Of course, let me go get them,” Isabella said as soon as Luna told us what we were there for. But that meant that Hammer had to go, too, and my sister glanced at him and said, “Actually, can we finish lunch first?”

“Sure,” Luna said. “Avalon and I will be in the game car.”

On that note, I nearly raced out of the dining car to go play my game. I’m getting pretty good at it—Luna even says so—and I’m coming near the end since I’ve been playing so much. She says that there is sequel to it but it’s a bit different and more challenging, but I think that if I can handle this game, then I can probably handle the next. We spent a good half an hour playing before Isabella and Hammer appeared with several large textbooks.

My sister crouched next to me and waited until I paused before she set the books in my lap. They immediately weighed me down.

“What _is_ this?” I asked as I picked up the first large volume. Already I wasn’t looking forward to what Cassiopeia had chosen for me. But to my surprise, instead of it being a medical textbook or something extremely dull like that, she had found a massive collection of short stories and poems. The next book was a geography book about the twelve districts of Panem and what sort of plants and animals you could find in each region. And the third book was about rocks. Not nearly as interesting as the other two, but considering they had come from Cassiopeia’s personal library, it was much better than I expected.

“Oh, this is cool,” Luna said as she picked up the first book with the poems and short stories. She thumbed through it and looked across the pages. “They have some good stuff in here.”

“We should have a poetry or dramatic reading night,” Hammer said as he glanced over Luna’s shoulder to check out the book. Then he added, “Just us victors, not the staff.”

Luna and Isabella said that it sounded like a great idea, so my sister and Hammer disappeared to find the other victors to see if they’d be interested. Then they returned to us, and now we have to go to Isabella and Hammer’s room this evening to sit around and read out of the big volume of stories. I’m actually kind of excited for it.


	27. Chapter 27

**_The Train en route to District 4_ **

The short story and poetry reading went very well last night. There were some fun and crazy stories in that book. Some good little adventures, too. But then everybody started to get tired and then it became silly with people reading in different voices and trying to make serious works sound ridiculous. I can’t remember the last time I laughed so hard.

Luna has me on a schedule today:

I will get to play videogames for an hour.

Then I need to read from the geography book for two hours.

Then lunch.

Then more geography.

Then a bit more videogames.

Then dinner.

Then videogames.

Then we will have a repeat of last night and read some more out of the book. Everybody seems to enjoy it.

**_The Train en route to District 4, but like 3 hours later_ **

Well, the schedule got messed up when they found Gerald dead. (He was drowned in his own toilet.)

I have to say that if I were the murderer—and let me stress to you here that I am not, though I’m sure it’s clear by now—I would probably find a better way to kill somebody. Luna says that maybe Mr. Riverton is having fun with this now.

And speaking of, Cynthia is inconsolable again. This time she says that she heard Humphrey Riverton speaking with her this morning, and she knew that she should have said something to the Peacekeepers, but she didn’t.

This time they’re not stopping the train. Instead they moved Gerald’s body into the freezer in the kitchen car since we’re not using it because everybody is still eating MREs. His bedroom has been locked up so no one can get in, and it’s under Peacekeeper surveillance 24/7 so that nothing is messed up before an official investigation is done. But we’ve already lost enough time on the Victory Tour, so now future deaths are no longer allowed to slow us down.

In all the chaos, Luna and I got our lunch and then she had us go to the game room and read from the geography book. Even worse, to make sure that I was actually reading, she had me read out loud.

**_The Train en route to District 4_ **

We victors still got together in Isabella and Hammer’s car in order to read again because what else were we going to do. Cynthia tried to tag along but Jericho reminded her that this car was very close to Mr. Humphrey Cucumber Riverton’s car and that it might be bad luck to be here right now. That frightened Cynthia enough that she scurried away without another word and left us to our own devices.

Nobody said anything about the murders. Nobody said anything about the Victory Tour. That’s the rule when it’s time to read from the book.

We sat around on the bed and in the chairs and flopped on the floor on beanbags carried in from the game car, and we passed the book around to whoever was interested in reading a short story or poem. The hours passed, but nobody pointed out that it was growing late and time was slipping away from us. Why should we? What was the alternative: returning to our own cars and staring into the darkness? Having more conversations with dolls? Wondering whether Dr. Newell would continue his murder spree?

On that note, I’ve noticed that I haven’t been required to meet with Dr. Newell since he first got on board. I see him in passing sometimes and I pretend that he’s not there because I’m sure that if I looked at him, I’d completely give away the fact that I know that he’s the murderer. We victors know that he’s the killer—and probably some Peacekeepers are aware—but I assume that the rest of the people on this train don’t know. What excuse does he give for his presence here if he’s not actually doing his doctor duties, or even _pretending_ to do his doctor duties?

Finally we were too tired to hold our eyes open, so we retired to our rooms for the night. It’s pretty late right now, so I should wrap up writing and turn off the lights.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am literally losing track of all the characters I've killed in this story. I even have a running list.


	28. Chapter 28

**_THE OCEAN!_ **

I see the ocean! It’s so cool.

So.

Cool.

It’s real. Like not a video or photograph. This is just the coolest thing I’ve seen this entire trip!

The train travelled along the coast for awhile, and I remained glued to the window to watch the waves roll up on the beach. It was amazing.

Now we are going to go and see the ocean for ourselves!

**_Back on the Train for a Few Minutes, Still in District 4_ **

That was just so amazing. They let us out of the train and we got to spend an hour on the beach. Of course there were tons of Peacekeepers to guard us—like they thought the District 4 people were just going to attack us or something—and onlookers gawked as we ran up and down the beach. Luna, Jericho, and Cronus were more reserved, but even they were enjoying themselves.

I’ve been in sand before, both at the school playground and when my parents ordered some for the obstacle course, and obviously I know how to swim, but to combine both of them together. . . . I just can’t even find the words to describe it.

By the time we got back on the train, every inch of me was covered in salt, and I had sand in places that I didn’t think sand could go, but it was totally worth it. I don’t think we were actually supposed to go into the water because they didn’t give us bathing suits but that didn’t stop us. Luna was laughing pretty hard at me when I found sand in the pocket of my shorts, though she stopped laughing when it was her turn to shower and she found sand all over the bathroom floor.

Then the time for fun was over, and we had to get ready for the speech. Europa doesn’t bother me quite so much to practice what’s on the cards a thousand times over because I caught on pretty quickly and am good at giving speeches. It seems like it’s one less thing for her to worry about, especially now that we’re on the buddy system and she can’t just leave Isolde behind to get me to say the same two paragraphs over and over for three hours straight.

Okay, now I have to leave.

**_The Train en route to District 3_ **

With all the excitement happening around here, I forgot all about District 4.

It wasn’t until I was on the stage that I remembered that I killed both the tributes.

The finale.

I almost died.

Why did nobody remind me?


	29. Chapter 29

**_The Train en route to District 3_ **

Luna says that I should try to write again, so I guess I will.

Seeing two dead tributes standing with their families unnerved me, but it didn’t distract me from my speech. Not even when I realized that I actually knew these people’s names—they weren’t just generic dead tributes. I had spent our training days in the Training Center with them and eaten lunch with them and had made plans with them. Of course we knew that it would never work out and that only one of us could live; that’s how it goes when you’re a Career. So it’s not like the fact that I killed them was all that surprising.

Yet they betrayed me. Within minutes of the Hunger Games starting, the other Careers turned on me and tried to kill me. The District 4 female had threatened me with her trident, and then she tried to shoot me with her bow. She and her district partner might not have initiated the attack against me, but they sure as hell were okay with it.

Of the five other Careers, the pair from District 4 were the only ones I killed. It was during the finale after I killed Jessica and I knew that I had to make my move to end the Hunger Games. The three of us were the final tributes left, and I was so close to victory.

The girl was easy enough to kill. I climbed into the trees and used the growing darkness of the evening to my advantage. When I released the arrow from my bow, it made a critical hit and the cannon boomed.

But the boy—he had a weapon I hadn’t been anticipating. And he almost killed me. I was better than him and when he thought that I was down, I managed to strike with my last burst of energy.

I won.

And then—

What?

I spent six days in the arena. Short compared to many other victors’ Hunger Games. But in the span of six days, I went from a girl who was living her dream—the one thing she had always hoped to be part of—to a girl who regretted every single flick of her knife. Because no matter how hard I practiced in grueling conditions and no matter how much my parents tried to stamp away any humanity from me by denying me friends and making me hurt others, the truth was that I was still human. And the things that I saw and the things that I did were not things that a human should ever experience. The scream of the girl whose leg I broke in elementary school paled in comparison to the agonized cries that I heard first-hand within the arena. This wasn’t television. This wasn’t something glamorized. There was no background music to mute the screams and the sounds of violence.

I did what I did because I knew no other way. I killed because that’s what had been drilled into me. Had I the skills, I would have taken on the entire Career pack at the Cornucopia, but they were too great in number and strength, so I fled. And then I met Jessica and things suddenly became _real_.

Jessica was a real person. She didn’t want to be there. She didn’t want to die. She had been chosen by pure luck, and she didn’t have the skills to compete with me, and that seemed so phenomenally unfair. To both of us. She wasn’t competition; she was just a teenager. How could I kill somebody who couldn’t even defend herself? I knew I would have to, of course, just like I killed other teenagers who couldn’t defend themselves. But unlike those other kids, I spent time with Jessica. I learned about her and I knew things that maybe even her best friends at home didn’t know. Here the Hunger Games had given me the opportunity to know somebody—I mean, to really become acquainted with someone—and in the end I knew I would have to kill her. And I think I realized while I was there that the thing that I wanted the most after all my years of training was the one thing I couldn’t have at all: a friend.

Messed up.

What sort of psychopath realizes mid-arena that the life she’s led means nothing and all she wants more than anything in the world is to have a real friend—one that she doesn’t have to hurt or kill?

I would pretend that Jessica was my friend after that. Please, just bear with me because I know this sounds nuts, and it is, I get it. But after I got out of the arena and I was in the hospital floating in and out of consciousness, I could almost convince myself that we were friends. I’d spend the time that I wasn’t being sociable with my sisters or the rest of the District 1 team daydreaming about the two of us and all the adventures that we’d have. I never told Dr. Castillo because I knew that this pushes the boundaries of insanity, I think. And besides, she’d just tell me that I was feeling guilty or something, and I wasn’t really.

When I saw the District 4 tributes tonight, at first it didn’t bother me, at least not really, but after the speech was over, a rush of thoughts raced through my head. For some weird reason or another, I blamed the District 4 tributes for everything. I shouldn’t have; they were just the same as me, weren’t they? But still I found myself thinking that if they weren’t there that things could have turned out differently. It doesn’t make sense at all.

For the first part of dinner, I held up well. And then I just . . . I don’t know. I mean that honestly. I don’t know what I was thinking or what I was doing. I was just kind of in some other world of blood and gore and then somebody was screaming at me and someone grabbed onto me and I fell to the ground under the person’s weight.

Isabella says that I almost threw myself off the roof of the Justice Building. Luna had the good sense to follow me and she tackled me before I took the step off. It was only a couple of stories, so I probably wouldn’t have died, but maybe I might have, depending on how I landed, so I’m grateful that she was there.

I don’t want to be on the Victory Tour anymore. I don’t want to be on the train. Murders or no murders, I just want to go home.

I don’t even know where home is anymore, though, and that just makes things more difficult to think about.


	30. Chapter 30

**_The Train en route to District 3_ **

After I finished writing, Luna pulled me into her arms and we lay in bed for awhile as I sobbed into her sleeve.

“We’re almost done, Avalon,” she told me. “District 3, then District 2. The Capitol, but that’s not unfamiliar to us, is it? Then just District 1 and we’re done.”

I just wanted off the train. I didn’t want to be here to be reminded of the things that I’ve done, and it didn’t matter how many more stops there were. As soon as I go back home, I’m going to the hospital, and you can bet that I can’t wait for that to happen. Because that’s how my life goes: I’d rather be hospitalized than do anything else because “anything else” involves going on murder trains and telling everybody how much I enjoyed killing their kids and being a beacon of victory for everybody to look up to.

It’s funny how Luna knows things. Like she knows how to get me to speak because when she asked me to tell her what was bothering me, I just started barfing words everywhere. Somehow she managed to sort them out of my gasping sobs and understand them despite the lack of coherency. And I even admitted to her things that I haven’t admitted to anyone else and how desperate I am for a friend because I was never allowed to have one but I really want one like everyone else has.

“I will be your friend, Avalon,” she said gently.

And I, being the rude person I am, blurted out, “But you’re old!”

She laughed. “I do have several years on you,” she said. “But that’s okay because we can still be friends. You can have more than one friend, and I’m sure you’ll find some people your own age in time.”

“Where?” I asked. “The psychiatric ward?”

That made her laugh harder. But I was kind of being serious there. Still, she said, “Maybe. But you go to school where you’re around many of your peers, and you’re going to be around a lot of other victors over the years. Maybe you could meet some people your age in the Capitol if you start looking for group activities.

“Go ahead and rest now, child,” she continued. “You need to get some sleep.”

All I had to do was say something, and like that I had a friend. Obviously it was just Luna and not some friend I made on my own, but I understood that I couldn’t be too picky. I closed my eyes and despite all the crying and how much my head hurt from stress and everything, I found myself drifting off. I curled up into Luna as she found her book and opened the pages to read, and I let myself vanish into sleep.

However, I was woken up several hours later with a knock on the bedroom door. My eyes fluttered open and I felt more exhausted then ever—you know how it goes for the first couple minutes after you wake up from a heavy nap?—and Luna put down her book and went to answer the door. I couldn’t quite see who it was, but there was no yelling and screaming so I assumed it meant that no one had died. After a minute, Luna closed the door and came back to me.

“They want you to meet your new staff team,” she said heavily.

“Ugh,” I muttered as I rolled over and buried my face in my pillow. After a second, I moved just enough so that I could say, “Can we not meet them so that when they die, it won’t bother us?”

“I don’t know why they insist on replacing people when they’re just going to get killed,” Luna agreed. To my dismay, however, she said, “But we need to continue on with the Victory Tour, so let’s at least do our part to say hello.”

The new stylist is named Sweetheart. The new escort is Empress. There are two prep team members Spike and Flurry. They all smiled at me and told me how happy they were to meet me in person.

“Don’t be too happy about it,” I said to them matter-of-factly. “I’m fatter than you think I am, so get over it because I don’t want to hear your moaning about how hard it is to let out seams because that’s pretty much your one job anyhow. And honestly, you’re all going to die soon enough, so there’s no need to get familiar on a personal level.”

“Avalon—” Luna said. She pressed her hand against her forehead.

I shrugged and then turned around. She was forced to leave the others and follow me to the game car so that we wouldn’t be separated and break our buddy system.

Come dinnertime, the new staff—and Cynthia and Carat—joined us for dinner in the dining car where we ate our MREs. The entire time, Cynthia updated the new people about Humphrey Riverton and how best to avoid him. Here are the most recent Mr. Riverton facts:

  * He likes classical piano music (as mentioned previously) but if you add in a bit of strings to that, he’ll love you forever. (My note: why would you even want him to love you?)
  * He eats nothing but the finest foods and since the kitchen staff has been dismissed, he can be seen frequenting the kitchen car. (My note: by the way, we still have the kitchen car solely to put dead bodies in the freezer, just in case you were wondering why they didn’t detach it entirely when they dismissed the staff.)
  * He has been seen inside of people’s bedrooms at night – several people have reported waking up to find him watching them.
  * He whispers the name of the person who will die next right before he kills you. (My note: I don’t know why he bothers. And also how do people know this if that person then dies?)
  * If you hear your name spoken three times while wandering the hallways of the train, it means that you are the next to die.



That last fact got a bit of excitement out of one of the new people, Spike, who said that he heard his name spoken _twice_ and he wanted to know if it was three times in a row, or if it was just three times overall. Cynthia assured him that it had to be three times in a row, and that he likely narrowly missed death by leaving before his name was spoken a third time.

There were so many people in the dining car that I was grateful I had brought the doll with me to keep me company while everyone else was chatting. Aside from the new additions, nothing much had happened today. Still, the new people wanted to know everything possible both to better acquaint themselves with their job and to keep themselves safe from death. All in all, they took it in good stride and weren’t nearly as freaked out as the last crop of new staff. _Maybe they’ll live,_ I caught myself thinking. But then I stopped myself before I could get too attached to them.

Time to stop writing so that we can have story time again tonight!


	31. Chapter 31

**_The Train en route to District 3_ **

We are almost at the train station, so I have to write quickly.

Storytime went over just fine last night, though we had to turn away a couple of staff members. Cynthia was all bent out of shape about it, but the new person, Flurry, said that it wasn’t a problem and that they could keep themselves occupied. I’m not sure how late we stayed up, but it was long after everyone else went to sleep that Luna and I crept back to our room.

As we passed through the hallway of Carat’s car, the door opened, and who should leave but Dr. Newell. At first he didn’t see us, and Luna motioned for me to stay still in the hopes that he would go the opposite direction and never see us at all. But he turned around, and for a very long second or two, our eyes met.

He looked like he always does—he wasn’t dressed for murder—but even in the low lighting, I could see that there were flecks of something on his shirt. In his hand was a heavy stapler, and the underside glistened. Strands of hair clung to the surface. He broke eye contact with me only to turn to the nearest window, open it, and toss the stapler outside the moving train. And then without another word, he turned and left.

Luna and I stood there for several moments longer before we turned and headed back the way we came without another word. My heart thumped rapidly, and I tried to get myself to calm down, but it wasn’t happening. I’m no stranger to violence, but that was just . . . I don’t know if I can even put it into words. To know that Dr. Newell just murdered someone—Carat—and we witnessed him leave and there’s nothing we could do about it. . . .

We couldn’t let the Peacekeepers know because that would place us at the scene of the crime, and if Dr. Newell is being protected by somebody, they weren’t likely to just take our word and arrest him.

Luna directed me back to Isabella and Hammer’s room, and we knocked on the door and slipped inside. Isabella sat cross-legged on the bed flipping through the poem and story book, and Hammer was lying down on the other side of the bed watching something on television.

“What’s wrong?” Isabella demanded when she saw our pale faces.

It took a moment before Luna managed to find her words: “We were on our way back to the car when we decided it would be fun to have a sleepover in here.”

Again, words between words. She couldn’t say the truth because these cars are all bugged, so she said something entirely different in the hopes that my sister and Hammer would understand what she said. I’m catching on very quickly, you see. Because there’s no reason that myself and Luna would want to have a sleepover with Isabella and Hammer, so it was obviously a lie.

(By the way, Isabella, are you and Hammer actually sleeping in the same bed? That’s weird.)

Hammer waved his hand to the car around us. “Make yourselves at home,” he said.

Isabella was slightly more helpful and dug up a bunch of extra blankets and stuff for Luna and me to sleep on. At that point, Hammer offered me his side of the bed and I declined. Not that I didn’t want it, but I also didn’t really want to sleep where Hammer was sleeping because it just seemed weird and I think the avoxes have given up washing the sheets every day. So Luna and I made ourselves little nests on the floor, and I was grateful that I was wearing clothes comfortable enough to sleep in so that I didn’t have to go through Isabella’s closet and steal her clothes.

My sister asked if we’d like to read from the book together. It seemed weird that we would read without all the others, but Luna said that it would be nice so we did. As we were partway through, I realized that it was just a performance we were doing because we wanted anyone overhearing this to think that we actually did return to have a sleepover with them.

I stayed awake long after the lights went out and listened to the sounds of the other victors. Isabella and Hammer fall asleep right away, but Luna, like me, didn’t succumb to sleep. I could hear the other two’s breathing even out. Here’s another fun fact of our Career upbringing: we (or at least me, I don’t know about my sisters) were taught how to tell whether somebody is asleep for real or whether they’re faking it. These two were asleep for real.

After at least an hour of lying there in the darkness with the motion of the train rolling me back and forth ever so slightly, I grabbed onto my blankets and pillows and scooted closer to Luna.

“What’s going to happen?” I asked quietly so that I wouldn’t disturb the others. There was no point in trying to lower my voice enough so that the bugs wouldn’t pick me up, so whatever I said had to be worded with that in mind. Hence why I didn’t specify that I was referring to us seeing Dr. Newell in the hall.

“I don’t know,” she whispered. “But it’s best we get to sleep.”

“If I could, I would,” I answered.

She didn’t answer me for a moment. She rolled over so that she was facing me and said even more quietly, “It’s not for us to worry about right now. Our job is to continue on with the Victory Tour, and to do that, we need to be well rested.”

If Luna had been on every Victory Tour since she won—which is normally what victors in District 1 do I think, though I don’t know how other districts handle it—then this is her eighth time on this train. She knows better than any of us how Victory Tours are supposed to go and how we are supposed to handle ourselves. I knew that I should listen to her advice and try to get some sleep, but it wasn’t working when another person was dead for no reason at all.

Of course I couldn’t voice this, and not just because we weren’t supposed to know about Dr. Newell but because this was reminiscent of the Hunger Games, strangely enough. The deaths of the escorts and stylists and prep team members were completely senseless. There was no point to them. Wasn’t that the same way the Hunger Games went? Was there any point to the things we had to do? Sure, we killed and lived and we’re victors now while the staff members who survive won’t get that sort of title, but does it matter? I curled up in a ball wrapped in all the blankets and thought about how these various staff members were dying and their families would miss them. But they were expendable. Just like tributes. Just like Isabella had been to our parents.

Eventually I fell asleep. I was woken up in the morning not by sunlight streaming through the windows but by the sound of voices in the hallway. For a moment I thought, _What now?_ before I remembered that somebody had probably found Carat with a fatal head wound. And that’s exactly what it was.

Isabella and Hammer were disturbed by the event, but the moment that they saw Luna and I go about our business picking up our bedding without blinking an eye, they calmed down. They couldn’t ask us outright, but when they looked at us and we looked right back, I think they probably knew enough to piece together why we returned to their room last night.

Once again, the Murder Express didn’t stop, and Carat was moved to the kitchen car to be stored until we reached our stop in District 3 for tonight’s dinner and speech. We victors spent the majority of our day in the game room where we said very little. How many people had died now?

Mildred, the first, was stabbed in the face.

Blue-Anna, the second, was poisoned.

Bobby, the third, was decapitated in his bedroom.

Flamingo, the fourth, was pushed off the moving train.

Kleo, the fifth, was shot in the back of the head during the séance.

Gerald, the sixth, was drowned in his own toilet.

Carat, the seventh, was bludgeoned with a stapler.

That’s a lot. That’s quite a few dead people. It’s—

One two three four five six seven.

As I’m writing this, a chill goes through me. . . . How many will die?

Why do I think that there are only a couple left?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I was proofreading/reviewing this chapter, I just started laughing like a maniac because all I could think of was a line of murder weapons in the wake of this damned train where Dr. Newell had chucked them all out the window.


	32. Chapter 32

**_The Train en route to District 2_ **

The good news is that I didn’t try to throw myself off any buildings. The bad news is that every single beverage at dinner looked like blood. (I ended up drinking it anyhow, and then I got a bit tipsy because I didn’t realize that it was alcohol, and then Europa got annoyed and switched it out for what she said was water but was still totally blood.)

The dinner itself was alright, and we got to meet more victors. District 3 doesn’t have a whole lot of them, though. I don’t know why since they could be a Career district if they wanted to be. I guess they’re just a bunch of nerds who prefer to stay indoors and play on computers which is good for their industry but bad for whatever kids go to the arena. The victors I met today were Zinc (126th), Gamma (110th), and Joule (109th). Since Luna, Joule, and Gamma won back-to-back-to-back years, they are well acquainted with each other and get along pretty well. Joule invited us back to victor village, but Luna said that we had to keep on moving since we were so far behind.

“The rumor is that there have been a few murders on this Victory Tour,” Gamma said to Luna as we ate dessert. Europa had excused herself to dance with somebody, so Gamma had taken her chair. He barely looked at me as he tried to get filled in on the gossip.

“Is that public knowledge?” Luna asked the two of them casually.

“Not officially, but it’s been going around,” Joule answered. She barely touched her dessert and slid it over to me when she noticed me eyeing it. Good thing Europa wasn’t there because otherwise she’d whisk it away again so that I couldn’t eat more than my “fair share.” So I gobbled it down as fast as I could so my sister wouldn’t see, and then I washed it down with a few big gulps of blood-water.

“Which means that they will need to either come up with a reason why so many people have died, or deny it entirely,” Luna murmured. “I’ve been trying to convince Avalon that this isn’t what normally happens on Victory Tours.”

“It’s all very exciting but I’m exhausted,” I said to them. Nobody said anything for a second, so I probably said the wrong thing about that. But how does one contribute to the conversation in a polite manner when it comes to things like this? Joule looked pointedly at Luna, but Luna didn’t acknowledge the stare. Maybe Joule wondered if I was becoming unhinged. I’d say . . . yes, definitely.

You know, I don’t know if all of the victors know that I’ve been in the hospital since I won. It’s probably not something that they had any need of knowing. I’m sure at some point in time or another, it’ll become common knowledge—just like the murders on our Victory Tour—but for the time being, my mental issues have faded off the radar.

When we left the dinner and waited for the car to take us back to the train, Luna explained that we need to be prepared for whatever the Capitol has in store for covering up this “little issue” that we have on the Murder Express.

“They’re not going to blame me, are they?” I asked, a sudden surge of anxiety welling up within me. We have tried so hard to keep with the buddy system and have done very well, but if the Capitol can spin this however they want, who’s to say that they won’t pretend like the buddy system never existed at all.

“I don’t think so,” Luna answered. “There’s no benefit to them in blaming you.”

But that’s all we got to talk about it before the car arrived and we were taken back to the train. All ability to talk with each other about what’s going on vanished.

As we had done previous nights, we gathered in Isabella and Hammer’s room to read from the story and poem book. Unfortunately the festivities in District 3 had worn people out, and we didn’t stay for too long. We bid everyone goodnight and returned to our car, but we found Flurry, one of the newest prep team members, waiting for us. She smiled at us despite the late hour and asked if she could come in because she had to take a couple new measurements.

Luna told her no, but she pressed the issue and to my annoyance, the older victor let her inside. So much for being my friend.

Except that’s when things turned strange because once we were inside with the door closed, Flurry said that her name was Dr. Fluorine and she was not a prep team member at all but a therapist who had been dispatched to work with me. She insisted that I call her Flurry, though, and said that we would have to continue to meet in secret.

“Why?” I asked. “I already have a doctor.”

“Which is precisely why I was assigned officially to the prep team and not as a doctor,” Flurry said to me. She’s a young-ish doctor—maybe twenty-five or so—and average height. Unnaturally bright eyes and pink and purple hair. Definitely doesn’t look doctor-y to me. But the way she held herself once she was in the privacy of my train car made me think that maybe she was telling the truth. She continued, “Nobody wanted me to step on any toes, so they gave me a different role. But my purpose here is to help you on the next few stops.”

“We only have three more stops,” Luna pointed out. “They couldn’t have sent someone about ten stops ago?”

“Let’s just say that things might get a little stressful the closer we get to the Capitol,” the doctor said. Then she turned to me: “It’ll be an honor working with you, Avalon. Dr. Castillo sends her wishes.”

“You work with Dr. Castillo?” I asked, raising an eyebrow. “Or are you just saying that?”

“She is a colleague of mine, but we do not work together directly,” she said. “Now, I think it’s best that you get some rest, but how about after breakfast tomorrow—say, 10:00 AM—we have a bit a fitting for your outfit for District 2?”

I shrugged, which she must’ve taken as a “yes.” Well, even if she were actually fitting me into an outfit, she’d probably do a better job than the now-deceased Kleo and whatever the newest person is named. (I’m really having a hard time keeping up. And should I even bother anymore?)

So the “dress fitting” is happening tomorrow morning whether I like it or not, unless Mr. Riverton gets to Flurry first.

Luna turned to me once Flurry was gone and said, “Well that was unexpected.”

I didn’t answer. Why should I bother allowing a new doctor into my head when the previous one wasn’t who he claimed to be? Who’s to say that this one will be any better? Maybe Dr. Newell wasn’t making quota so they had to send Dr. Fluorine to help.

“She might be able to help you,” Luna said with hesitation.

Instead all I said was, “You can share the bed with me tonight. You don’t have to sleep on the floor anymore.”

“Why the change?” she asked.

I shrugged. “I guess because you’re my friend now,” I said. “And also because I realized how hard the floors were last night.”

She smiled at me. “Thank you, Avalon,” she said. “I will take you up on your offer.”

The beds are big enough for several people anyhow. I don’t know why I didn’t extend the offer before. I guess I figured that it was my room and my bed and she seemed to be pretty content down on the floor even if it wasn’t comfortable. So now she’s lying on the other side of the bed, headphones in her ears, reading a book. It’s about time to turn out the lights, so I’ll stop writing for now.


	33. Chapter 33

**_The Train en route to District 2_ **

I did not kill anybody in District 2, but Dr. Newell sure did.

(How is that for an opening line?)

Spike, the prep team member, was stabbed in the chest and his heart was carved out. They found him in the freezer already ready to go. His heart, on the other hand, was still in his bed.

Dr. Newell is getting wild and crazy now. Simple knife attacks and poisons will no longer do.

I wonder how they are going to spin this. There are now eight people dead. Eight who will not return to their family and friends. Surely this will not be something the Capitol can pretend never happened. I don’t know what to expect of it, but it makes me nervous.

Flurry insisted on meeting at 10:00 AM as originally planned. Since we still have the buddy system in place, Luna sat in the armchair of our car and listened to music through her headphones while she read her book. I watched Flurry set down a basket of sewing supplies that she had used for a prop to get her in the door without anyone questioning her, and then the two of us sat cross-legged on the floor across from each other.

At first I didn’t want to talk much with her. She, like Dr. Newell, had read my file and was well-versed in my history. She even wanted to know about my hallucinations and the things that I saw while I was in the various districts, and I had a sudden memory of Dr. Newell doing something very similar. However, where Newell wanted me to give him the exact details and body count, Flurry just wanted me to give her the general gist of things. She asked me about any other strange behaviors, and I told her what I could. I even told her about the doll. She didn’t make any comments, just jotted down a few notes here or there into a notebook. All this stuff, I figured, was common knowledge that she could have gotten it if she asked anyone; it wasn’t like I divulged anything particularly sensitive.

So then she started to discuss with me all sorts of scientific things that kind of went over my head but I nodded and pretended I understood anyhow. Things like where hallucinations come from and why we have them. She went over possible reasons why I might be having them and—get this—she even said that the trauma of the Victory Tour might be causing them. Not, like, the _excitement_ of the tour. Or even the _stress_ of the tour. But the “trauma.” I wondered if maybe she didn’t know that my room was bugged, but the conversation went on as she gave me some things that I was supposed to do to help me over the next couple days. She is very happy that Luna is having me read the geography book and that I’ve found a new hobby in the videogame that I have almost completed (once I get done a few more side quests, I’ll proceed with the main game). When she heard about the story and poem book, she said that she was delighted that we victors had found something positive to do with our time.

It did remind me of working with Dr. Castillo and her staff, though it obviously wasn’t the same. And it was certainly better than working with Dr. Newell, though I suppose I didn’t even have to write that in this book, did I?

“Alright, I think that will be it for the time being,” Flurry said to me at the end of our session. “Do you have any questions, Avalon?”

“How do I know that you’re really here to help me?” I asked immediately. The question had played on the tip of my tongue for the majority of the session, but in all the information she was giving me, I didn’t dare ask it. I kind of wanted to see how things would play out.

She smiled at me. “Somebody put in a request for an additional therapist,” she said.

“That ‘somebody’ could be anybody,” I stated.

“Somebody from the districts,” she said. “A friend, maybe?”

A friend? I don’t have any friends. So obviously she didn’t mean a literal friend. But who from the districts—oh, wait, I suddenly remembered that one of the older victors had offered to make a phone call. I let the thought roll through my head for a moment. We victors all seem to be pretty connected, don’t we? Even if we never talk with each other aside from formal events like the Hunger Games and the Victory Tour.

When I asked no more questions, Flurry stood up and grabbed the basket of sewing supplies. She tucked her notebook inside. I stood, too, and walked with her towards the door. She turned to me before she left and said, “Same time tomorrow. If you need anything in the meantime, you know where to find me.”

“Thanks,” I said. She stepped out the door and I was about to close it behind her when I hesitated. For a moment, I considered keeping my words to myself and letting her go, but I thought better of it. “Flurry?”

She turned around. “Yes?”

“Please take care of yourself,” I said quietly. “Mr. Riverton has only been going after staff members.”

She nodded. “Thanks, Avalon,” she said. “You victors are pretty clever to have devised a buddy system.”

I closed the door and took a deep breath. Why the Capitol decided to send Flurry now—if they even sent her at all—was beyond me, but I was grateful that she was here. Because talking with her took the smallest weight off my chest and made me feel a hair less crazy.

But I only gave myself a moment before I returned to Luna and tapped her on the shoulder. She jumped but then smiled at me. “How’d it go?” she asked as she pulled the headphones off and paused her music.

I shrugged. “She was better than Dr. Newell,” I said. “But that’s not really a high standard, so I guess I don’t have too much to say about her.”

“Well, I’m glad that they finally came to their senses and sent somebody,” she said. I didn’t bother to mention that it was one of the other victors who put in the request because if it was common knowledge, the doctor probably wouldn’t have been so vague when she said something about it. Once we are off the train and in some place relatively safe to speak, I’ll let her know.

With therapy out of the way, Luna suggested that we go to the game car and see what the others were up to. By that she meant that she would socialize and I’d play videogames. So I eagerly agreed and grabbed up the doll. The two of us stepped out of the room and into the hallway. The game car was several cars away from us, but we knew the way well enough after all this time.

However, as we walked through the halls, we came to a stop when we saw Dr. Newell emerge from his room. He walked over to the window and opened it up. Without hesitation, he threw out something that looked like a tiny knife, though I didn’t get a good look before it disappeared out the window. When he turned around, he saw Luna and me standing there. This time there was no pretending that we didn’t see what we saw. We couldn’t just turn around and go to another part of the train.

“Who is it now?” I asked.

Luna sucked in a breath beside me.

“Excuse me?” Dr. Newell asked, eyes honing in on me.

“Who did you just kill?”

He laughed at my question, his eyes glittering in the late morning sun that filtered in through the windows. Obviously I was a bit blunt there and he had no obligation to suddenly spill out his connection with Mr. Riverton and the murders.

“Nobody,” he said, and I didn’t believe him though I said nothing. But then he continued, “It was from earlier.”

“A scalpel to cut through ribs?” Luna asked. Now that the topic was open, there was no going back.

He shook his head. “Just to remove the heart after the ribs were already out of the way,” he answered.

Geeze, he was so casual about this. Like he didn’t even care that we were having this conversation in the middle of the hallway of a relatively crowded train. But then again, it wasn’t like anyone was ever going to arrest him for the horrible things he’s done, so I guess one can be that blatant when things are going your way. Career cockiness, we’d call it back home. When you have a potential tribute who was so full of him- or herself that they thought that they were unstoppable.

“Now, you ladies just hurry right along,” he said. “I didn’t mean to interrupt your lunch plans.”

“Of course,” Luna said. When I didn’t move, she grabbed onto my sleeve and gave me a tug. I had no choice but to comply, though I stared Dr. Newell down when we passed him, and even afterwards. He just laughed at me again and shook his head like I was really a source of amusement for him. But the door closed behind us, and I broke visual contact with him.

“What just happened—” I started, but Luna shushed me.

We can’t speak about it on the train. That just won’t do. But the truth lingers between us, and one day or another we’ll be able to talk about it.


	34. Chapter 34

**_District 2 Victor Village_ **

I thought that I’d be free from the majority of stress and hallucinations now that we were in a district in which I didn’t kill the tributes, but no such luck.

“We had a confrontation with Dr. Newell,” Luna said to the victors who had gathered in the mansion of Alexis of District 2. She won a few years before Luna and although Luna said they weren’t really friends, per se, they still got along fine. Now it was all of us from District 1 as well as some of the District 2 victors: Sapphire (144th), Butch (128th), Freya (121st), Ferrer (118th), Vulcan (111th), and Alexis (104th). Dinner had long since ended, and because I botched everything up, the Victory Tour had decided not to move on tonight and to give me a day to recover so I wouldn’t be a complete mess when we got to the Capitol.

Those of us from District 1 had already explained to the victors of District 2 about Mr. Riverton, though the topic had long since lost its humor given the circumstances of tonight’s dinner.

Which, I’ll just put it out there because I don’t want to keep trying to avoid it: I didn’t eat dinner because I said that I was dead, and I guess I was a little too liberal with how many people I said this to because there were quite a few people who asked me why I wasn’t eating and I explained simple as could be that I was dead and dead people don’t need to eat. Now everybody knows I’m nuts. Hey, what’s new?

But it was just a _touch_ too much for the Capitol because we were then put on leave for a day for me to rest up. The official reason was because of the stress of the murders. But I think it’s the stress of the Victory Tour in general. Or, what did Flurry say? The trauma of it all? So now we’re staying with Alexis here in District 2 for the evening, and tomorrow we will be on our way once more.

I, personally, don’t think we should have stopped. I just want to power through this and get it over with. There’s a hospital bed in the Capitol that has my name on it, and I’m very eager to fill that spot.

Yet here we are, so I guess we’ll have to make do with the situation.

You know, nobody asked me about the doll. I asked an avox to fetch it from the train when I realized that we wouldn’t be going back, but then Isabella and Hammer said they’d get it. Well, Isabella did; Hammer just had to go because buddies. When they returned, my sister gave me both the doll and this book. Anyway, I have a sneaking suspicion that people were warned not to ask about the doll. Or maybe they just have the common sense to realize that it’s a bit out of place and the story that surrounds it is a bit upsetting.

So, anyway, back to the conversation about Dr. Newell:

“What happened?” Isolde asked when Luna had said that we had a conversation with him.

Luna sighed. “Avalon asked who he killed because we saw him dispose of a scalpel out a window, and he said that it was from cutting Spike’s heart out of his chest,” she explained. “But the fact that we saw him do this—and that he told us what he was doing—didn’t faze him and he went on with business.”

So then the conversation turned to what the hell we could possibly do in order to stop Dr. Newell. Unlike the victors of previous districts, the people here in District 2 were bound and determined to help us find a way to put an end to it.

And with that, we hatched a plan.

I’m not going to write it here _just in case_ someone manages to decode this book (which I really don’t think they’d do, and they certainly won’t get this far into it to read the details of the plan, but I’m not taking any risks). Honestly, it’s not that great of a plan anyhow, but at least it’s something so that we’re not sitting around waiting for him to kill the next expendable person.

Then the evening continued as normal like we hadn’t just created a plot to stop a wild murderer. Eventually people began to trickle away—some of us to our rooms and others back to victor mansions—and Luna said that it was about time we went to sleep. So I had no choice but to follow her to the bedroom that Alexis had assigned us. Even though we’re not on the train, everybody insists that I stay with Luna. I think that my fellow District 1 victors are really worried that I’m going to do something outright crazy, so they just shove me at Luna and figure that she’ll handle me.

So here I am in our room writing, and I think I’ve said all that I need to say for the day.

**_District 2 Victor Village_ **

It’s not a bad victor village, if you ask me. A great amount of stone, but otherwise it’s light and airy compared to some of the other places we’ve been. District 1 still has the best victor village of all—our mansions are only a half-step down from what the rich people in the Capitol have, with large windows and plenty of sunlight and fresh air—but this one isn’t bad by any stretch of the imagination. Certainly better than District 5 where the mansions only let in sunlight for about 2 hours a day (okay, maybe I’m exaggerating), or District 7 that was swallowed up by trees.

Soon we have to go to the train station in order to head off to the Capitol. Because they don’t want us to have our festivities there tonight which is when our train would probably arrive, they are going to take us on a longer route to the Capitol. Which really just gives Dr. Newell more time to murder people. You’d think that they’d want to get to the Capitol as fast as possible.

“I think they want Dr. Newell to do it,” I told Luna as we sat in the backyard of Alexis’ house. Everyone was hanging around talking with each other, but they stuck mostly to the porch. Only Luna and I were crazy enough to sit on a snow-covered rock out in the sea of white.

“It certainly seems that way,” Luna said. “But the question is why? They’re going to have to explain one way or another why so many people are dead. You can bet that Cynthia has already blabbed this to her friends back home, so there’s no way they could blame an accident or anything.”

Not to mention all the people _we_ had told about what was going on.

“It’s strange that Dr. Newell hasn’t killed off any victors, isn’t it?” I asked as I looked at the porch filled with familiar faces. And some not familiar; a couple of the victors had brought over family or friends to hang out.

“It does make it suspicious,” Luna answered, her voice a little distant as she got lost in thought.

But that only put thoughts in my own head. Why would the Capitol allow Dr. Newell to murder anybody, let alone eight—and probably soon nine—people? Some people had ideas, but none of them were good enough to be convincing. So if the staff members weren’t secretly prisoners that were slated for execution or whatever else everyone had come up with, what was the reason that this was allowed to happen?

“And it’s also weird that—” I hesitated.

Luna turned and looked at me, waiting for me to finish my thought.

“It’s just that it’s weird that the Victory Tour is taking this long,” I continued. I shrugged and picked at a bit of snow that had drifted down from the branches of the tree above us and landed on my knee. The pants I wore were waterproof enough that I wouldn’t feel the bite of cold as it soaked into the fabric, of course. “When Europa and Isabella went on theirs, I remember them telling me how there were very few stops and everybody just kind of hung on and powered through it all, even when they weren’t feeling well. Now we’re stopping for almost everything.”

“Yes, that’s right,” she said. She contemplated this for a moment and added, “During Isabella’s tour, there was a bit of a stomach bug going around, but as long as neither Europa nor Isabella got it—neither of whom did, which is good for them because it was pretty nasty—the train didn’t stop.”

And yet we’d had many days added onto our trip for constant stopping. At first it made sense because there were crime scenes and all, but then everybody gave up caring because nobody was trying to find the murderer. Now you add onto it the nights that we’ve spent in various victor villages, and the extra days that should have been spent on travel really added up. Surely that has pushed back the festivities in these later stops by several days, and the Capitol has had to postpone the celebrations within its own city many times now. And here we were going to be taking the leisurely way back to the Capitol.

None of it sat right with me.

“Why do you think they’re doing it this way?” I asked Luna, turning to look at her.

She didn’t answer for a long minute. When she did, she didn’t speak with great confidence. “I think that nothing on this Victory Tour makes sense, but I also think that it’s supposed to be that way,” she said carefully. “I have a suspicion that whatever is going on isn’t just _allowed_ by the Capitol but is facilitated by them.”

That only opened up _more_ questions, and my head was starting to hurt as it was.

“But we might actually never know the answer,” Luna said after a brief pause. “Sometimes that’s just how it goes.”

No way. After all of this, I _have_ to know the answer. I can’t just pretend it never happened or be satisfied by whatever excuses people give. One way or another, I am going to find out the truth.


	35. Chapter 35

**_The Train en route to the Capitol_ **

Our plan started out so well. It wasn’t a super complicated plan, and it was probably something we should have done to begin with, but none of us wanted to get involved in the deaths and end up being accused of murder. So we stayed away. And more and more people died. So we put our plan into action. Essentially each pair of us plopped down in front of the door of one of the remaining staff members so that nobody could get into their rooms. Luna and I guarded Flurry; Europa and Isolde guarded Cynthia; Jericho and Cronus guarded Sweetheart; and Isabella and Hammer guarded Empress.

That was step one of the plan and it started out alright. Step two involved never leaving the staff member alone. I think that if we had put this plan in place at the beginning of the trip, the whole bunch of us victors would all be driven insane by the constant whining and demands of the staff team. Not that Flurry is like that—though she loses her “doctor” persona when she is in public and is almost as bad as the rest of them—but still it would have pushed us to madness to be around someone like Cynthia twenty-four seven. But we never got to step two because other things happened.

As you know, trains have windows.

And as we have also discovered, Dr. Newell is pretty good at accessing these windows. That’s how he killed Kleo in the middle of the séance. Somehow he managed to either climb on the roof or cling to the side of the train (the latter of which makes me laugh and I’ve included a little sketch in the bottom right corner of this page for you), so that he could shoot through a slightly open window.

Dr. Newell walked by us once or twice, each time pretending that he was just out for a midnight stroll. When he disappeared, we figured that he had given up.

But no. Because suddenly we heard commotion from inside Flurry’s room.

Luna and I jumped to our feet and started pounding on the door. It was firmly locked—as we had told Flurry and the others to do, stupid us—and there was no way we could get in. But there was chaos from within as though somebody was throwing someone else around against the wall and knocking over furniture and all that stuff. At last Luna managed to give the door a kick at just the right place that it opened, and we tumbled inside.

Right in time to see Flurry slice open Dr. Newell’s neck with his own weapon.

The window was wide open, and bits of snow drifted in on the wind generated from the movement of the train.

And Dr. Newell was dead on the floor of Flurry’s car, blood pouring out of the laceration in his neck.

Flurry tossed the knife onto his chest and panted from the fight. She looked almost . . . invigorated.

But the moment she saw us, the excitement began to dull out, and the “doctor” took over. She nodded to us to acknowledge our presence before she went over to the phone and picked it up. After a moment, she said, “This is Flurry. Can you please send the Peacekeepers over to my car? Dr. Newell is dead.”

And before she had a chance to say anything, the Peacekeepers swarmed into the room. They kicked Luna and me out, and they spoke with Flurry, and then a few more held us back in the hallway and took our statements. We explained how we were guarding Flurry’s door to make sure no one broke in, and then we heard commotion from inside. When we got the door open, we found the two of them in a fight, and then Flurry killed Dr. Newell.

They dismissed us, and told us to go back to our rooms and get some sleep.

Yeah, right. Like anyone would be doing that.

So we gathered up the other victors and met in Isabella and Hammer’s room like we were going to be reading again, but this time Luna and I filled them in on what happened. Everyone clung to our words and eagerly ate up what we had to say, exchanging excited expressions when we said that Dr. Newell was dead.

“Flurry’s a badass then?” Jericho asked. “Who knew that a prep team member could manage something like that?”

Prep team member. Doctor. Now I was having serious doubts that she was who she told me she was.

As excited as we were, we knew that we had to get some sleep because we weren’t getting any more answers tonight. Luna and I went looking for Flurry, but we were told that she had been moved to a different car to spend the night while her other car was under investigation. Somehow foreboding, but what can you do? So Luna and I went to bed.

We woke up before dawn when we heard Cynthia wailing from the hallway in front of our car. Despite having gone to bed mere hours before, we were on our feet and at the door before we could even think about what we were doing.

“M-Mr. Riverton! H-he said m-my name th-three times!” she blubbered.

So then Luna and I had to calm her down. Part of me wanted to tell the frantic prep team member that Mr. Riverton had died with Dr. Newell, but that would do no good. After all, we weren’t supposed to know that Dr. Newell had been the murderer. It was such common knowledge for us victors by now that it was hard _not_ to say anything, though. Since Cynthia couldn’t be calmed, Luna and I accompanied her to the dining car and sat with her while she drank coffee and poured out her heart and soul to us about how frazzled this entire trip had made her.

You know, it’s kind of funny that Cynthia is still alive after all of this. She is the only original person from the team, and she managed to survive the deaths of both the first and second generation staff members. But she has clearly been traumatized by the event, and she confided that she hasn’t been able to sleep more than an hour or two at a time for the past few nights. It made me feel a little sorry for her, especially since all of the people who she’s worked with were murdered, and she had been the one to find Blue-Anna.

No, I guess it’s not funny, is it? None of it is funny. We just wanted to celebrate my victory, and all we ended up with were more dead people. They weren’t kids, but does it matter? Does it matter if they were Capitolites or district residents? No, it doesn’t. Just more dead people associated with my life, and I don’t want it anymore. I don’t want any more death or violence or anything like that. I want to have a small little house and have chickens and cows in the yard and have friends and enjoy my life.

I’m really tired, but I’m going to continue writing.

Before the others woke up, Luna and I once again went searching for Flurry (we left Cynthia with a few Peacekeepers who promised to keep an eye on her), and this time we found her in a new car. I think—but I’m not one hundred percent certain—that they have spare bedroom cars attached to this train so that if a death occurs in one, they don’t have to worry about people not having a fresh car to go to. Even though if a death occurs in a car, it normally is the person who occupied the car who died and an extra room is not needed.

Flurry welcomed us in and bid us to sit down. She had been writing at the desk but closed her notebook and set it aside. There were not enough chairs to go around, so the three of us made ourselves comfortable on the floor.

“Where’d you learn skills like that?” Luna asked the woman. She crossed her arms and leaned back against the wall. “Something they go over in medical school, is it?”

“It’s always good to keep on your toes,” Flurry answered us pleasantly enough. “Now, Avalon, how about another session?”

I didn’t want to have another session and I thought it was pretty weird given everything that just happened. In my hesitation, I glanced at Luna who just shrugged, putting the decision fully into my hands. No, I didn’t want to have another therapy session. I really didn’t.

“I’m tired of people dying,” I found myself saying firmly to the doctor. “I don’t know why Dr. Newell had to kill all those people and—”

“Dr. Newell?” Flurry cut in. She raised an eyebrow. “Yes, I suppose that makes sense since he tried to kill me.”

“Why’d he do that?” I asked. “Go after you, I mean.”

She smiled at me. “There’s an open investigation going on, so it wouldn’t do for me to say anything about it at this point,” she said, not unkindly. In other words, don’t ask because I’m not telling. Well, fine. “But let’s talk about how you are handling all of the murders. . . .”

Luna, realizing that it was actually turning into a therapy session, slipped her head phones on, grabbed a magazine from the desk, and made herself comfortable in the armchair in the corner of the room. I waited until she was fully situated before I turned back to Flurry.

So I told her that the murders were stressing me out because there was absolutely no need for them and already enough people had died. And I said that I was grateful that I had the other victors here to support me, and that we actually supported each other, so it really wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but that I was really going to miss Blue-Anna who did her best to make my sisters and me happy. I’d even miss Mildred even though she was sometimes a bit too bossy. I didn’t see why they had to die, or why the Capitol didn’t do more to stop subsequent deaths. I was angry that Dr. Newell said he was there to help me but then he only made matters worse. But in the process, I had made a friend in Luna because I had spent more time with her than I have before, and she was actually really nice even though she’s so much older than me.

Flurry listened and nodded and said things sometimes, but mostly it was just me venting about everything that was going on. She smiled where it was appropriate and kept her face neutral when smiling wasn’t the right reaction. In the end, she congratulated me for hanging on through this tough time and assured me that we would be at the Capitol soon, and then we’d be off to District 1 for the final step of the Victory Tour.

It’s stupid that we have to go to the Capitol, then to District 1, and then go back to the Capitol. I wish we could just do District 1 first to get it over with and then we could stay in the Capitol when we get there. But, as I mentioned, it is very unusual for a new victor to live full-time in the Capitol, so they weren’t going to just change the order of things to convenience me. And why should they when they have literally made this Victory Tour the most inconveniencing thing possible?

“I’d like to continue to work with you, Avalon,” Flurry said as Luna and I were getting ready to leave her room. My legs ached from sitting on the ground for so long, and I was grateful to stand up and stretch them. But I didn’t know what to think about Flurry’s words, so I said nothing. She continued, “You won’t be able to go back to the hospital until the Victory Tour is complete, so I hope I can be of assistance to you until then.”

Well. She was not Dr. Castillo, but at least she hadn’t started murdering all the Hunger Games staff yet.

“Yeah, okay,” I agreed. Part of me was grateful that she offered, but I have to admit that there was a good portion of me that was curious about this woman and wanted to learn more, even if I didn’t get any actual therapy out of it. Therapy or no, at least she let me talk without judging me or asking unnecessary or awkward questions to tease out details I hadn’t wanted to divulge.

The day winds down. It’ll be time for bed soon, but first the other victors and I are once again meeting up for our evening reading. And even though we don’t need to, I think all of us are sticking with our buddy system. It would be weird to be on the train and not be tied to Luna after all this time.


	36. Chapter 36

**_The Capitol_ **

I’m back, but only briefly. I have just a few moments to write about the interview.

Yes, the interview. The one that victors have to do when they reach the Capitol on the Victory Tour. The one nobody prepared me for because my escort is brand new and has no idea what is even going on anymore. Yes, that interview.

It went very poorly, thank you very much.

We got off the train and Europa reminded me that I’d be interviewed this afternoon. I’d forgotten, of course, but I figured I could handle it. And anyway, it’s not like I had to sit there and stare at the families of the people I’d killed, right? Right. She went over some of the basics with me, but I barely listened because this was my umpteenth interview.

So Caligula Klora got me all situated in front of the live audience, and he smiled at me and welcomed me to the Capitol. And then he launched right into the interview.

Caligula: “So, Avalon, are you having a good time on your Victory Tour?”

Me: “Yes, I just _loved_ seeing all of Panem! It’s so beautiful, and I am so grateful for the opportunity to be a part of it.”

Caligula: “Of course you are! We watched you on television, and you were just so elegant on the stage. Really represented District 1 so well. I bet they’re so proud of you.”

Me: “I’ll be going back soon! Then I can see for myself, but I have no doubt that they are!”

It’s complete garbage, the things we have to say. But that’s how we were taught, and I’m not about to go and say something that might be a little more truthful. I hate how I have to present myself, like I’m borderline airheaded and so stupid that I just adore everything the Capitol has done. Even before the Hunger Games, I thought that this style of buttering up the interviewer and the cameras was not my cup of tea, but that’s what our speech instructor taught us to do, and that’s what I’d seen my sisters do, so who was I to question it.

There were a few more lines of garbage, and then things took a turn for the worse.

Caligula: “From what I understand, there may have been some mishaps on the train. Is that true?”

Me: “What do you mean, Caligula?”

Caligula: “Well, at first we here at home were a little uncertain what was going on, but then we heard rumors that somebody had died on the train.”

See, here’s the thing: if I had had a decent escort, I probably would have been prepared for this question. But nobody had prepped me for it. Nobody had told me what to say. Not my current escort. Not Flurry. Not even Europa had gone over this scenario and drilled it into my head. I guess nobody expected it to come up in the interview that was supposed to be about my victory.

And now I was all alone answering a question that I had no idea how to answer.

It wasn’t just one murder. Or even two. But nine people had died on this Victory Tour. And I was supposed to say something to the _entire_ country about it—but what was I supposed to say?

Do I play it down and say that the rumor was wrong? I didn’t want anyone to think that I was making light of the grave situation.

Do I tell everyone that the horrors they heard were indeed true? That might be making the Victory Tour look like something unappealing.

How about I just start hallucinating blood welling up between the floorboards of the stage instead? Yes, that sounded like a great middle ground.

Of course, despite that, it didn’t help me answer Caligula’s question.

Me: “Yes, people died.”

Caligula: “’People!’ So more than one person died!”

Me: “I don’t know the specifics.”

The blood was pooling up on the wood beneath our feet. Caligula couldn’t see it, of course, but I could. It was thick and sludgy—not a whole lot like real blood, unless it coagulated, I suppose—and yet it still moved easily.

Caligula: “But people were actually dying on your train?”

Me: “You will have to check with the train operators or peacekeepers probably. If you want more details. I think I’m best to tell you about everything else that happened! Have you been to all these districts before, Caligula?”

That distracted him a bit, and so we had a bit of back-and-forth about the different districts and how exciting it was to go to all of them. Then we talked about how nice it was for me to be a victor and how everyone in all of Panem was so happy that I was there as the representative of the 146th Hunger Games. I smiled with him and went along with it because it’s not like I could say that there were at least twenty-three families out there who weren’t thrilled that I was victor. Honestly, the interview seemed to have recovered just fine. And then. . . .

Caligula: “Some people are saying, Avalon, that _you_ might be the murderer on the train.”

Me: “Don’t be silly, Caligula. I’m only a murderer in the arena.”

Cue the awkward silence that not even Caligula knew how to answer.

Caligula (after a bit of hesitation): “So back to the train. . . .”

Me: “Why? I don’t have any more information to give you about it.”

Caligula: “Certainly you must have some thoughts on it!”

Me: “None. I’d like to go now, if that’s okay.”

Caligula (surprised): “So eager to leave!”

Me: “I have a party to go to!” (I think I recovered that pretty well, all things considered.)

Caligula: “Of course, my dear Avalon. We shall not keep you from your party.”

The interview wrapped up as normal. He thanked me for being there, and I thanked him for having me there, and he spun my insistence on leaving as me being excited and impatient and it probably wasn’t as absolutely terrible as I felt it was. My smile burned my facial muscles from having to force it in place for so long, but at last I was excused, and I hurried off stage the moment that the curtains fell.

And then I barfed all over one of the backstage attendants.

“Woah, Avalon, hang on,” she said as she lead me over towards a trash can and had me finish vomiting into that. She didn’t even seem miffed that I had lost everything I’d eaten today onto her pristine collared shirt. But she didn’t have time to assure me that everything was okay before Europa swooped in and stole me away from her.

My sister didn’t say anything at all. Instead she only led me to the bathroom where she helped me clean myself up. Without a functioning staff team, we have to make do with whatever we have, so it’s not like I could have an escort to navigate me wherever we needed to go and make excuses for my sudden illness. Once we had tried to scoop off and wash away any flecks of vomit from my face and dress, she led me out of the bathroom and through the back of the auditorium and towards a waiting car.

Then we went to this hotel that we’re in right now. Again, no functioning stylist. The one that’s here with me, Sweetheart, doesn’t know what she’s doing. Cynthia is only barely tolerable but at least she is trying to keep Sweetheart on track. Flurry has not a single drop of fashion sense to her since she’s a doctor slash assassin and trying to get somebody into a dress probably isn’t her forte, so she’s not really that good at anything except asking me how I’m doing and if I want to talk.

So I started writing in here so that everyone would leave me alone. It’s worked, but now I have to face the inevitable and get ready for tonight’s party. Wish me luck.


	37. Chapter 37

**_The Capitol_ **

Europa chewed the escort, Empress, out because I had not been fully prepared for the interview. As I got dressed for the party, I had the sound of Europa’s rage as background music. And yet it made me smile. At least _someone_ is being held accountable for their job.

My older sisters wouldn’t let me out of their sight the entire time. Of course I couldn’t have an entourage crowded around me for the duration of the party, so Europa kicked Isabella away and told her to go pretend to be sociable. She wouldn’t even let Luna hang out a whole lot because she didn’t want us to look like too much of a crowd.

I tried to tell myself that this is what I always wanted, that that this was my dream, and yet I couldn’t get the taste of blood and vomit out of the back of my mouth.

So I danced with whoever wanted to dance with me, and I socialized with whoever wanted to say hello to me, and I drank beverages and ate food and all those sorts of things. I pretended like I was living my best life and that this person who was projected to everyone at the party was exactly who I wanted to be. The music, the frivolity, the fun—everything was here because of _me_.

And yet I was seeing it through a blood-covered lens. See, here I am—I might not be socially adjusted, but I’m good at observing things. And I could see how the other victors avoided certain people at the party, and how most of the time they’d put on a persona of their own when they engaged in conversation, and they suppressed a cringe when somebody’s hand went a little too far down their bodies. I could tell that their laughter wasn’t real the same way that I can tell when people’s snores aren’t real. Everything was a show, and I couldn’t turn off the fact that this wasn’t where I wanted to be.

I’m tired. I just want to be done with this.

“Europa,” I whispered in the smallest whisper. “I want to leave. I don’t feel well.”

My sister started to tell me to hang in there, but she paused and stared hard at me for several seconds. At last she nodded and said, “Yes, I think we’ve done our time here. Let’s get back to the hotel.”

We gathered up Isabella and told Isolde to let the others know that we were headed out, and with no escort to guide us, we dismissed ourselves from the party.

As much as I wanted to throw myself in the shower for a quick clean-up and then crawl under the blankets to sleep, I couldn’t. My body dragged, and I took nearly twice as long in the bathroom as I needed to, and when I finally re-emerged, I found that Isabella and Europa had already changed into their pajamas and Luna had returned, though she was still in her long dress. None of them paid attention as I crept out of the bathroom and climbed into the closer of two beds. It was only then that I realized they were all staring at the television.

“What is it?” I asked.

“It’s about the Victory Tour and the murders,” Europa said.

But then it cut to a commercial, and when it returned, the news announcer didn’t give any more information except that it was confirmed that there were several murders on the Victory Tour and they would be sure to keep us updated. Everything was currently under investigation but the remainder of the tour was to go on as planned. When it was clear there was nothing more than that, Europa turned off the television.

“Time for bed,” my oldest sister said to me.

“Is that all they said?” I asked as I nestled into the blankets and pulled the thicker comforter up over them. Europa likes to sleep with the room way too cold, so layers of blankets are always a must around her.

“We were hoping to hear more, but that’s all they said,” she confirmed.

But the three of them continued to stare at the dark television screen as though they could glean more information from it. In the shiny black surface, I could see their reflections. Quiet. Contemplative. Not angry. Just . . . confused? Concerned? I couldn’t quite make out the details of their features in the screen.

Now that the murders were public, so, too, was the fact that the Capitol needed to explain why it didn’t stop them. It wouldn’t look good for the all-powerful Capitol to let nine people die in their care. So how the heck was this going to play out? I lay back into the bed and stared up at the ceiling. I had hoped that they would have cancelled the remainder of the Victory Tour so that we could just stay here in the Capitol, but I suppose if we came this far, there would be no reason to stop. With nine people dead (a magic number), it was unlikely that a tenth would die.

Luna left to go to her room, but my sisters stayed here with me. Technically all three of us could have had our own rooms, too, but Europa insisted that we stick together. So my sisters went to clean up for the evening and remove the thick layers of makeup on their faces. Isabella finished first, and she came over to my bed.

“You okay if I sleep here with you?” she asked. I nodded, and she turned off the nearby lights and climbed into bed next to me. Only one light near the other bed remained on so that Europa could find her way through the room whenever she was finished in the bathroom.

“One more stop,” I whispered to her once she was settled in.

“I’m sorry it had to be like this, Avalon,” my sister said quietly. “Victory Tours are stressful, but this really was way worse than it should have been. I hope that they don’t drag out the investigation too long.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, furrowing my brow. “They’ll know who it is because Dr. Newell was there the entire time, and Flurry was almost killed by him.”

She sighs and glanced off past me. “Sometimes the Capitol likes its drama,” she said. “It wouldn’t surprise me if they made this into something for gossip and entertainment.”

Entertainment just like the Hunger Games were. This time we weren’t in the arena and we weren’t in any physical danger, either. But people were still dying, and now the Capitol would get a bit of fun out of it.

“But Capitolites died,” I whispered, dropping my voice even lower. “They wouldn’t want to be entertained at the expense of their own people, right?”

My sister turned her attention back to me and shrugged. “I don’t think it was originally done for their entertainment, but I think they’ll find it entertaining anyhow,” she answered. “That’s what happens—even back home, you’ve seen the news. There’s some intriguing segment on a news show, and then the public gets wrapped up in it. Hence why Mom and Dad were so insistent on covering up Augustus’ death. They didn’t want anyone finding out that he died, but it would have been even worse if it ended up the subject of a news segment, even just locally.”

I nodded like I understood. Maybe I do understand, at least a little better now that I’m writing it out. But the conversation ended there, and Isabella instructed me to get to sleep. I tried, but it took several hours before I could finally turn my brain off. My sisters shuffled around and tried to get comfortable, but eventually their breaths evened out as they fell asleep, and I was left staring up at the dark ceiling wondering what was going to become of this Victory Tour.


	38. Chapter 38

**_The Capitol_ **

After I finished writing this morning, we had a full day ahead of us: a photoshoot with all of us District 1 victors, a luncheon engagement with some of my sponsors, another interview—this time with my sisters and no mention of murders because it focused on us and how happy we were to be victors together—, another party with more rich people though perhaps not as rich as the one yesterday at the president’s mansion. They kept us very busy, and with no mention of murders or anything of that sort, it wasn’t bad at all. Of course by the time the party came around, I was pretty overwhelmed and people kept asking me if I was feeling okay. I couldn’t tell them that all the tablecloths that held vast amounts of food were tinged red and I really felt a bit nauseous after the day’s events, so I just smiled and said that everything was just fine.

Tomorrow we’ll be on our way to District 1 for the final portion of the Victory Tour. There will be another speech and feast, just like there were in the other districts, and then the following day will be the Harvest Festival. I have always enjoyed the Harvest Festival, even when it wasn’t our tributes who won. Every city or town celebrates it a little differently, but ours has always been a big fair with contests for various arts and crafts, and live music, and plenty of food, and lots of excitement. We, unlike some of the outlying districts, don’t really have a “harvest” in the typical sense. I know it’s probably just a play on words to go hand-in-hand with things like “reaping,” but other districts do take it a little more literally. But since our specialty is luxury goods, there’s not anything for us to literally harvest.

In the past, I’ve always gone with my sisters even before Europa won the Hunger Games. It was one of the few “normal” things my parents allowed us to do, and it really was fun. There were all sorts of things to look at: quilting, photography, paintings, to name some of the crafts. But then they had pie-baking competitions and pie-eating competitions and all sorts of things like that. Once I had a classmate who won first place for a sculpture she made. It was an ugly thing, but everyone was telling her how proud they were of her and how beautiful it was.

I’m getting myself all worked up and excited about it, so I should probably put my pen down and get to sleep.

**_The Train en route to District 1_ **

Before we left the Capitol, I was summoned to a private meeting at the hotel. My sisters went with me, but the moment we stepped into the room, it was clear that it wasn’t what we expected. Honestly, I’m only fifteen, so I wasn’t worried about being whored out to rich people even though both Europa and Isabella were _certain_ that’s what the private meeting was about, but instead of some fancy wealthy person, it was the President of Panem.

My sisters and I stood there for a fraction of a second before our training kicked in and we remembered our manners. So we greeted him politely using the politest of politeness that we knew, and he smiled at us. He’s an older man, but he’s had plenty of plastic surgery to make him look younger.

“It’s lovely to see the Vitner sisters all together,” he said to the three of us with a smile that was probably less trustworthy than Dr. Newell himself. He sat in a large chair, but it was clear that he had only expected one of us because there was only one other chair in the small sun-filled room. “If you don’t excuse me, I’d like to speak with Avalon privately.”

That’s probably one of the scariest phrases I’ve ever heard anyone say in my life.

But my sisters could not object, and they politely excused themselves and left me standing there with the president.

“Please, have a seat, Miss Vitner,” he said as he motioned to the one chair. I did as I was instructed and took my place. He smiled at me again, and I suspect it was to put me at ease, but it didn’t.

Even coming from a pro-Hunger Games family, I knew that President Kincaid wasn’t somebody to be messed with, and a private audience with him could only mean bad things. I had heard of such private audiences—but only in whispers from older victors—and they very rarely resulted in anything positive.

“Now, Miss Vitner, I suppose you understand that there is a problem on our hands,” he said to me calmly, but the entire time he was studying me very carefully. I didn’t answer him, but he wasn’t really expecting me to say anything as he continued, “Dr. Newell did a very good job—too good of a job, you see—and he left us a little mess on our hands.”

Wait, so even the _president_ of all people didn’t know how to handle this? What the hell was going on?!

My heart thumped in my chest and I clasped my hands together as I watched him. He didn’t break the calm mask he wore, not even as he revealed that he was just as confused as the rest of us on how this situation would be handled.

“I only have one solution, Miss Vitner, but I think you might be able to help me brainstorm others,” he continued. “Because if we don’t come up with a better solution, then I’m afraid we’ll have to go with what I have, and I’m sure you’re not going to like that one.”

“What’s your solution?” I dared to ask.

The smile widened. “You are the murderer, of course,” he said. At that, I had to turn on manual breathing just to hear him out. “You have a track record of insanity, so would it be entirely implausible to say that you killed a few more people? After all, nine people died on the train, and that so perfectly matches how many people died in the arena.”

“Then everyone would think that the Hunger Games drove me insane,” I whimpered. My speech training had not prepared me for this, and I had no idea how to proceed from here. It took all of my resolve just to sit there upright.

“They would, if perhaps they didn’t know about various children over the years you sent to the hospital,” he replied. “And, of course, we can always re-investigate your parents’ deaths, couldn’t we?”

I swallowed hard. Why? Why was this happening? My brain zoomed through a hundred different things, but none of them were relevant to the situation.

“So Dr. Newell won’t get in trouble for what he did?” I asked.

He shook his head. “It wouldn’t reflect well on us had we allowed somebody to kill so many people, would it?” he asked.

But he _did_ allow someone to kill so many people! If that was their concern, they should have stopped him earlier!

“So, Avalon, my question for you is this: Do you have a better solution to our sticky situation?”

At first I could think of nothing. Nothing at all. My brain was completely empty of everything that it could possibly use in order to figure out how to address this situation. In all of the Capitol, they couldn’t find somebody here to come up with a solution? It had to fall on _my_ shoulders to come up with a really good reason why I shouldn’t be blamed for all the deaths?

So I blurted out the first thing that made some sort of sense: “Everybody got sick and started hallucinating things and killing each other.”

President Kincaid considered this for a moment, but I feared by the way he started to shake his head that he wasn’t fully convinced. I licked my lips and pulled together a stronger argument.

“On Isabella’s Victory Tour, many people got sick from a stomach bug, and it passed around very easily,” I said carefully. “I wasn’t there, so I don’t know the details. But it wouldn’t be unusual for everyone to get sick. Or, maybe, there was a mold or fungus in the train and people inhaled it and started to hallucinate—like ergot or something, I’m sorry I don’t know all these things—but it took awhile for the source to be determined. And Dr. Newell was sent so that he could find the source but he couldn’t. And neither could the Peacekeepers because they were looking for _someone_ when it was actually _something_.”

I look over at the President, hoping that maybe he’d see that I had something here. It wasn’t _great_ but he could come up with something better to build on it, surely. Several long seconds passed in which he said nothing. He looked down at the ground in thought.

At last he looked up at me again.

“It would seem unusual that nobody on the train died of this mysterious mold or fungus and that everybody died because of wounds inflicted by people hallucinating,” he said. “But there’s still one last leg of the Victory Tour left. . . . There’s still room for one more person to die. Avalon, this mystery illness did not touch a single victor on the train. . . . That would be rather implausible. Why don’t you tell me which victor would be the perfect fit to die for the sake of your story?”

“I—” but the words didn’t come out of my mouth. I clutched at the material of my dress and stared at him. No way I could just choose somebody to die in something like this. My mouth closed and opened again, but I couldn’t force anything out.

He smiled at me. “If you want to save yourself from a horrible accusation that will likely be proven true, then you will tell me one name,” he said.

One name. Just one person. That person would die for the sake of my story, but I would be free from being found guilty of the murder of nine Hunger Games staff members.

Who would it be? Somebody like Jericho or Cronus who I didn’t know that well? Or maybe Hammer who had always been kind to me, even if he was a bit dumb sometimes? Or Isolde, who made my sisters and me always feel at home? Certainly I couldn’t choose my sisters. . . .

Luna.

But she was my friend.

How could I. . . .

I’d hurt enough friends. Killed enough. I’d finally gotten an opportunity to make a friend for myself who wouldn’t be touched by the arena, and now I would have to throw it all out. . . .

I turned to President Kincaid and sat up straight.

“You have some of the most intellectual minds in the entire country at your disposal, and you turn to a fifteen-year-old girl to solve this problem. Please use them to help. They’re so much smarter than me,” I said. He met my eye and I held his icy gaze knowing full well that this sort of behavior could get me in very, very big trouble. “And if it doesn’t work out and nobody can find a solution, then I will be the murderer. But please don’t kill any more people. Please don’t kill my friends.”

The tense silence that lingered between us amplified as the seconds passed. I was _way_ out of line in how I just spoke to the president, and there was no way I was getting out of here without some sort of punishment.

But how could I just turn over one of the other victors in order to save my own skin? After they have taken such good care of me over the past few weeks? Even before that, when I was a brand new victor, they had all taken me under their wing in some capacity.

“Miss Vitner, you are excused,” he said. “But I do hope you enjoy the rest of the Victory Tour and the last few days of freedom.”

I stood up and said, “Thank you, President Kincaid.” Without another thought, I turned and walked out of the room, doing my best to keep my expression as calm and neutral as I could manage. I had signed my own arrest warrant, and I could only wonder if perhaps I wasn’t so rude, maybe I could have gotten away free. But no. . . . it wasn’t because I was rude. It was because I wouldn’t do what he wanted me to do.

It was a trap.

I don’t know why it was, but now that I was in the hallway and no longer under the direct stare of President Kincaid, I could see so clearly how it was nothing but a set-up.

My sisters immediately rushed over to me, so I plastered a smile on my face and told them that everything was fine and he wanted to wish me a congratulations on almost completing the Victory Tour. Neither of them really bought it, but then I said that I was hungry and wanted something to supplement the meager breakfast Europa had allowed me to have, and then they went on about how I had had plenty to eat and it was almost time to get on the train anyhow.

So now I sit on the train and wonder if I did the right thing. Of course I did. It’s not just about me surviving, is it? That’s what my entire life has been about, and now I finally get the opportunity to _live_. After all the things I was done, after all the desperate situations I was put in, now I understand that I can’t prioritize myself over other people, noble cause or not.


	39. Chapter 39

**_The Train en route to District 1_ **

I’m having trouble focusing. We’ll be in District 1 soon, but everything’s too loud, too bright, too intense. The doll keeps whispering things in my ear, even when I lock her in the closet. She tells me to kill.

To kill Luna.

To kill my sisters.

To kill President Kincaid.

To kill everybody. Because if everybody is dead, then what threat are they to me?

I don’t know why she tells me this. She had been quiet for so long, and now she won’t shut up. And everybody else is demanding I go here or do this or whatever else, and then they ask me what’s wrong and I say I’m not feeling well but they just ignore me and tell me that I just have to hang on for another speech and dinner.

The Harvest Festival, something I once looked forward to, means nothing anymore. Just one more speech and dinner. Then I can disappear into myself and I don’t need to worry about keeping up appearances anymore.

**_District 1_ **

Speech: done.

Dinner: done.

Nobody cared that I barely made it through it. That I was hearing voices the entire time. That there was so much blood and so many bodies. That somebody kept screaming for my ears only to hear. Because now it’s done and the Victory Tour is over and everybody can go wherever they plan on going.

And I’m curled up in a closet in my mansion where nobody can find me because I don’t know what else to do to shut out the noises. They don’t stop.

I’ll tell Europa and Isabella that I’m going back to the Capitol. The hospital.


	40. Chapter 40

**_The Capitol_ **

Here I am in the Capitol, but things didn’t go as planned. It’s been several days since I last wrote.

Europa and Isabella accompanied me to the train station. Before we could purchase our tickets, however, Peacekeepers surrounded us.

“Avalon Vitner, you are under arrest for the murder of nine people on the Victory Tour—” said one Peacekeeper, and then he began to list off the full names of the nine people I supposedly killed.

My sisters immediately started protesting, but the Peacekeeper requested that they keep their opinions to themselves and hire a lawyer. He didn’t say it unkindly, and it was almost like he regretted what he was doing. But then he handcuffed me and led me away to the train that we had been going to be getting on anyhow. (Insert comment about getting a free ticket here.) My sisters bought their tickets and hurried on board before we left them behind, but they were seated in one part of the train and I was forced into another car with only Peacekeepers to watch me and make sure I didn’t try anything.

The ride to the Capitol wasn’t a fun one. I spent the entire time worrying about what would happen to me, and whether I’d be executed for killing all those people or if they’d just lock me up in prison for all eternity. They let me eat my meals, but I remained handcuffed to a chair the entire time with a hoard of Peacekeepers surrounding me. Some even had the nerve to point their weapons at me as though I was _that_ much of a danger.

Funny that killing nine people outside the arena is not acceptable and results in this sort of reaction, but killing nine people in the arena deserves praise. Oh well.

Once we got to the Capitol, I was escorted to the hospital again, and for a brief moment, I was so excited that I was going where I had wanted to go all along. But Dr. Castillo wasn’t there—I was told that she went back to her normal work—so things weren’t really looking up. There were a few familiar faces, but we weren’t given time to socialize before I was handcuffed to a hospital bed. Several Peacekeepers were stationed to guard me, and the door to my room was closed and locked.

Over the course of the next couple days, I was questioned and had therapy (not nearly as nice as I had imagined it) and given medications and questioned some more and etc. But I wasn’t allowed visitors, and when I asked about Dr. Fluorine, I was told that no such person by that name existed in the doctor database. Then the doctor I asked laughed at me and said that “fluorine” was too silly of a name anyhow. I should note that her name was “Dr. Smellie” so clearly she had no idea what she was talking about.

Finally Europa and Isabella were allowed to visit me, and Isabella brought this notebook with her. Isabella said the staff at the door looked through it pretty hard to make sure that I didn’t write anything terrible in there, but since it’s coded, it’s not like they could really tell. I’m not allowed to use a pen here, so I have to write everything in crayon. It’s hard using such a stubby writing implement in between these lines. Anyhow, I’m not complaining.

In addition to the notebook, my sisters brought news. It has been announced all over Panem that I have been charged with the murders of the nine Hunger Games staff team members, and some people are saying that of course it must be true. There are “conspiracies” that the nine “I” killed on the train somehow parallel with the nine I killed in the arena. There are other “conspiracies” that maybe I even killed my parents. And true to the President’s word, somebody has released information about various events through childhood which Dr. Castillo once assured me were “normal” given my upbringing but are now being used as evidence of my insanity before even going to the Hunger Games. There’s discussion that all Careers will now need to be psychologically examined before going to the arena—Isabella says that it won’t happen because most Careers are nuts to some degree and they wouldn’t have any more Career tributes if they actually went through with that policy.

But what I really want to know is _why_ this happened. Nobody will tell me anything because I’m supposedly the person who killed Mildred and Blue-Anna and everybody, so they say that I have to ask myself that question.

Sometimes I wonder if I really did kill them.

Europa and Isabella assure me that I did not but would they tell me if I really had?

Right now, the investigation is ongoing and the Peacekeepers are collecting evidence. I don’t know how investigations go, but my sisters say that I shouldn’t worry about it and they have hired a very good lawyer to represent me. I’m not to talk with any more people—besides the staff here—without my lawyer present.

“Have you heard about Flurry?” I asked them.

Isabella shook her head. “I’m sorry, but it seems like aside from Cynthia, all of the other staff members went into hiding,” she said.

“Flurry wasn’t a staff member,” I told her.

My sisters looked at me with confusion.

“What do you mean?” Europa asked.

“She was a doctor sent to help me, but an actual doctor not like Dr. Newell,” I explained. It seemed weird that this information that I had considered common knowledge wasn’t common at all since we couldn’t talk with each other. “Her name is Dr. Fluorine, but the staff here says that no doctor by that name is in the database. So I think maybe she’s actually an assassin. But . . . I just want some questions answered, and she might be the one to answer them.”

My sisters looked skeptical.

“I know that she defended herself against Dr. Newell, but that doesn’t mean that she wasn’t a prep team member,” Isabella said after a hesitation.

“Do you honestly think _any_ of those prep team members could have defended themselves?” I asked with an eye roll.

“Avalon, did she talk with you a lot?” Europa asked. “As a doctor or therapist?”

I shrugged. “Yeah,” I said. “A few times at least.”

They exchanged a look with each other and I stared at them with irritation. Now they were thinking things that they weren’t sharing with me, and I didn’t like it one bit. I asked them to share what was on their minds, but they said that it was nothing. Isabella started asking about how my stay here was and if I was allowed to socialize with the other patients.

I shrugged. Sure, I got some socialization, but I was always carefully monitored. My bedroom is painfully boring with only a bed and toilet and sink. It’s pretty much a prison cell but even worse because instead of being just dangerous, I’m dangerous _and_ crazy, so they have to take extra precaution to ensure that I’m not going to do anything stupid. When I’m allowed out of my room, I have to be in handcuffs. Sometimes they even cuff my ankles so that I can’t move very fast. It’s all pretty inhumane, but what can you do?

So I turned the conversation away from how hospital/prison life was and towards how things were going in the real world. Both of my sisters were getting ready for the new term at school which would start very shortly, but they assured me that they weren’t going to abandon me in the insane ward here. But I got them to start talking about what classes they were going to be in. Isabella was more than eager to babble about whatever smart people courses she was taking, but Europa was a little more reserved. She, like me, isn’t exactly a brainiac and I know that she’s only in school for my sake. Not that it matters now since I can’t go to school like this.

Anyhow, the nurses say that it’s time for me to stop writing so they can take the crayon back and assure that I won’t be trying to shove colored wax up people’s noses or whatever they think I’m going to do. Oh, and they also want this book so I don’t papercut everyone in their sleep. From behind my locked bedroom door.


	41. Chapter 41

**_The Capitol_ **

There isn’t much to write about these days. My schedule goes like this pretty much every day of the week:

I wake up at 6:30 AM. Then they take my vitals. Then breakfast at 7:15 AM, normally with medications which they watch us _very carefully_ to make sure that we take. Then I get to take a shower in a nice public sort of place where they can watch to make sure I’m not killing anyone. And then there’s group therapy, and usually some sort of group activity. Then lunch. Then private therapy. And then more activities and group therapy. Then dinner. Activities or television. More talking about personal things. Then dessert and more medications and then bedtime. It’s all very dull except sometimes people start going a little nutso and that provides us with a bit of a distraction. We get some downtime in there, but that’s the general gist of things.

Right now is my downtime, so I can write some. But it bothers me that they take this notebook away when I’m not writing. I’m scared that they’re going to decode it, and then they’ll find out all sorts of things that will get not just me but my sisters and other victors in trouble.

I think I’m going to start eating one page at a time.

**_The Capitol_ **

Just kidding, they saw me trying to eat this notebook and took it away for like a week, and then we had all sorts of discussions in the meantime about how I shouldn’t be trying to eat non-food items. (Because they think that I was trying to eat the book not because I was trying to hide it but because I was having more eating issues. They’re so weird!)

Since I last wrote, here’s my updates:

  * I’ve met with my lawyer. He assured me that everything would be fine, but he didn’t really look that confident. I guess I wouldn’t, either, if my client was set up by the president.
  * Luna came to visit me! Twice! She apologized that she couldn’t come sooner or more frequently, but it was nice to catch up with her again. (I cried when she left the second time because she was going back to District 1.)
  * They had therapy dogs come through and I got to play with one!
  * I asked the staff if I could have a therapy dog when I was released and they exchanged looks with each other. Oh yeah, I’m not getting released. And if I do, it’s just to be executed. Oh well.
  * We got a new patient, Gabriela, who is here because she murdered her dad and stepmom. I feel like I’m in good company being shackled to the chair during activity time.



You know what’s kind of funny? Whenever Europa and Isabella visit me (and even Luna), everyone gets super excited. My sisters have had to go and visit the other patients here on more than one occasion. I forget that we are celebrities. The other patients don’t view me as such anymore, but my sisters and Luna really brighten their days.


	42. Chapter 42

**_The Capitol_ **

Flurry came to visit me. Except her name isn’t Dr. Fluorine but Dr. Larunda. She said that I could still call her Flurry because that’s actually her first name. So Dr. Smellie was right and “Dr. Fluorine” was a made-up cover name. Ugh, why can’t _anyone_ be more straightforward in who they are?

As soon as she arrived, I demanded to know what was going on. And I specified that I wanted the truth with no details spared.

Flurry regarded this with a bit of curiosity before she asked if we could walk outside. I could tell the staff wasn’t thrilled about this, but it had been quite some time since I’d been outdoors and fresh air wouldn’t harm me, so I was all handcuffed up and they kept a very close eye on me as Flurry and I meandered through the open-air balcony accessible to the patients in the mental ward. (Don’t worry, it has force fields around it so we can’t throw ourselves off.) A recent snow had made the entire place so cold they had to bundle me up in a coat and hat and scarf despite the handcuffs.

“Who are you really?” I asked her immediately.

She smiled at me. “I’m a doctor,” she said.

“Of what? Assassination?” I demanded. “That’s a pretty broad title.”

We kept to the outskirts of the balcony near the railing. Whether it was for privacy from the others (as much as we could get) or for the view of the drab city below now grey and white, I didn’t know.

“I am a researcher, as was Dr. Newell,” she began. “He was sent to research some things on the Victory Tour, but he got a little out of hand, so I was dispatched to make sure that things didn’t get even _more_ out of hand.”

“What was he researching?” I asked.

“You,” she answered.

“Me?! Why me?”

She paused and leaned against the railing, so I stopped walking and moved next to the cold metal railing, too. There was a force field somewhere beyond the railing. A few inches or maybe a foot or two—I wasn’t in a mood to start exploring because those things can burn pretty badly if you touch it. So I kept a close eye on myself to make sure I wasn’t leaning over too far.

“There’s no secret among certain circles that many of the recent victors struggle with their status,” she said easily. “It’s very hard to keep them in line and ensure that they are properly representing their title, and sometimes extreme measures need to be taken. That in and of itself isn’t a problem, but it’s so much easier to have well-behaved victors.

“Now, Avalon, you and your sisters are something else. Your oldest sister has handled victory very well. Phenomenally. She is how we want all of our Career victors to be. Your middle sister falls into a more ‘average’ group—she’s pretty typical. But you, on the other hand, are extreme. The murder of your parents, the stays in the psychiatric ward, the hallucinations on the tour. You are not the sort of victor that we need. Which begs the question: how do we keep more victors from becoming like you?”

“Are you going to kill me?” I asked her quietly.

She laughed. “I have no intention of doing so,” she said. “But I’m not the one who makes that decision. I like you, Avalon, and I’m sorry that it had to come this. I don’t think you’re a bad person at all, but we can’t have victors like you running around and upsetting the order of things.”

“This is the last time I trust a doctor,” I muttered.

That only made her laugh more. “Yes, well, I think you should trust the doctors here at least,” she said. “Though I recommend exercising caution by trusting people just because they tell you that they’re a doctor.”

I frowned.

“If I hadn’t trusted you, then it would have gone on the record that I was, like, standoffish or something, and that would have been even worse,” I pointed out. “So I really couldn’t win there, could I?”

Just like I couldn’t win in this situation, either. I had been set up 100% and there was no way that I could have done or not done anything to make it better. I was a lab rat, and the goal wasn’t to help me but to study what I did when I was put into strange situations.

“So now that you have your information, can you just end the experiment?” I asked.

“Do you know how many experiments are ended?” she asked in return. When I didn’t answer, she said, “Our subjects are terminated. You wouldn’t want that ending, would you?”

No, I didn’t. Suddenly I didn’t want to talk to Flurry anymore. I ran my gloved finger across the railing to knock the accumulated snow off and watched the white chunks tumble to the ground. A few bits went over the other side, and a half second later there was a sizzle as they hit the force field. There was no escape from anything.

“I think you should be pretty proud to have been a part of this research,” Flurry said as she studied my reaction. I did my best to keep my face neutral. She continued, “We’ve found out a good deal about victors in general, and it’s endearing to know how much you all look out for each other, even between districts. At least three people called Dr. Castillo to try to get you additional help, did you know that? And then there’s also the way that you and your fellow victors from District 1 stuck together when everything went crazy and devised the buddy system. . . . You are all very resourceful.”

“Is that good or bad?” I dared to ask. I was becoming more and more aware that the things that we might value could very well be considered dangerous or undesirable by Flurry and whoever she worked for.

“I think I’ve shared more with you than I ought to have, as it is,” she said at last.

She wouldn’t tell me anymore, but she also didn’t make any move to go inside. Instead we just walked around the balcony a bit. I wanted desperately to believe that maybe things weren’t as bad as they seemed, but how could I?


	43. Chapter 43

**_The Capitol_ **

I’ve been in a bit of a funk since I met with Flurry, so I haven’t written. But today I had an odd encounter, so here it is:

My lawyer heard about this book and he wanted to see it in order to determine if it could be used for evidence of my innocence. I protested because I’d rather NOT have this book brought up because there are so many sensitive things inside it, but a nurse went and fetched it against my will. My heart thumped as she handed it to the lawyer, and I watched as he opened it up to the first page, half-eaten, and began to scan through it.

“I encoded it so it would be harder to read,” I explained to him when his brows furrowed. He flipped through a few pages. “I guess somebody will be able to break the code eventually, but I don’t think it will be easy.”

“How many people know that you write in this book?” he asked me, not taking his eyes from the pages as he turned through one after another.

I shrugged. “Quite a few, but nobody knows the contents. Really just my sisters and Luna and the staff here. Oh, also, I think some Peacekeepers might have found it when they were searching through the train, but I don’t think they were able to read it.”

The lawyer sighed, sat up straight, and set the book down on his lap.

“I can’t use this for evidence,” he said to me.

Relief washed through me, but I still found myself asking, “Why?”

“Avalon—this notebook isn’t coded. Nor is it comprehensible in any way,” he said to me. “It’s all just scribbles.”

“No it’s not,” I laughed. But he didn’t laugh with me, and the smile slid off my face. He handed me the book back and I opened it up and flipped through it. There was my writing staring straight back at me. Sure, I don’t have the neatest handwriting, but I wouldn’t call it “scribbles.” Coded, yes, but not scribbles.

The lawyer studied me for another minute and then excused himself to make a phone call.

When Isabella visited this afternoon, I told her what the lawyer said. “He’s crazy,” I told her. “I think he might benefit from a stay here.”

Isabella didn’t answer right away. She sat down in a chair in the visiting room and wrung her hands together.

“Avalon. . . . I know you’ve been dedicated to writing in your notebook, and I know that Dr. Castillo wanted you to, so we never mentioned it, but. . . .” She hesitated, and I cocked my head at her. She met my eyes and continued, “You haven’t written a single word in there. It literally is all scribbles.”

I laughed, but it wasn’t because I found it funny. It was a desperate scramble to grasp onto the truth. Of course I had written words. I hadn’t just spent the last several weeks doing little doodles and scribbles in a notebook. But Isabella’s face remained serious, and the smile disappeared off my face altogether.

“There really are no words?” I asked, my voice nothing more than the barest whisper.

“There are no words,” she confirmed. “When you said that Dr. Castillo assigned you the task, I thought that you knew what you were doing, that it was a way to get the thoughts out of your head.”

“That’s . . . unfortunate,” I managed.

I’m crazier than I thought I was, aren’t I, Isabella? Ah, but you won’t know that this notebook is even for you because you will never be able to decipher my “code.” There is no code. Just scribbles. All the things I’ve written have been forgotten forever, and there was no point to any of this at all.


	44. Chapter 44

**_The Capitol_ **

I wish I had never gone to the Hunger Games.

See, there’s this advantage to just scribbles, isn’t there?

I hated the Hunger Games. I hated training for them.

I hate that my entire life revolved around the Hunger Games, and I hate that I had no choice to go, but I was so brainwashed into thinking that it was my life’s mission. I hate that our parents had so little respect for us.

I hate that Europa loves the Hunger Games and thinks that they’re a worthy life calling.

I hate that it fucked over Isabella.

And Cassiopeia.

And me.

And everyone else.

I hate it all.


	45. Chapter 45

**_The Capitol_ **

They asked me how I pled, and I said, “Not guilty” just like my lawyer instructed me to. Even though they’d eventually blame it all on me, I wasn’t supposed to tell them that I was guilty.


	46. Chapter 46

**_Nowhere_ **

Did I ever tell you about Grandma?

You know about her, Isabella, but I think for the sake of writing, I’ll just pretend that the reader does not know.

Grandma won the 83rd Hunger Games. She, like me, was a master of knives. She, like me, dazzled the audience at home. She, like me, caught the attention of many people.

She is my paternal grandmother, and she was adored by everyone in the Capitol. They thought that she was an absolute goddess, and they loved her from the moment she volunteered as tribute. You can find all sorts of posters and trading cards and other memorabilia from the 83rd Hunger Games and shortly thereafter. Her popularity soared in the Capitol, and everyone wanted to say that they knew her. People couldn’t get enough of her, and they held her up as the ultimate victor.

My paternal grandfather was a man in the Capitol. That is all I know about him. I have never met him because shortly after my grandmother gave birth to Dad, she killed my grandfather for the things he did to her.

It was all covered up, of course, but Grandma was punished. I don’t know the details of her punishment, but they managed to keep her under control. She continued to be their goddess in the spotlight, but when the doors were closed, she was only mortal.

Dad was embarrassed by her, I think. Here was this woman whom everyone looked up to, and yet he knew the “real” her. The side that fell apart when reality grew too heavy. The side that struggled to raise him. The side that wanted little to do with the son she never desired. He admired her only for the sake of the cameras. And she mothered him only because she knew she had to.

Grandma eventually remarried a Peacekeeper, which was a bit of a scandal because they did it in private away from the Capitol’s eye. But he was a high-ranking Peacekeeper, and in some ways it was a bit glamorous and exciting. She moved away long before I was born, and every now and again I’d see glimpses of her on television or hear her on the radio. She always fascinated me, but I never met her.

She never taught me how to use knives. That was a lie my dad concocted just to make sure that everyone knew that our family was perfectly functional. That we were the perfect victor family. That they didn’t force us to go to the Hunger Games in order to improve their standings in society but because we were so devoted to the event my grandmother won.

We weren’t. We never were.

So why do I bring up Grandma?

Because she showed up after fifteen years of near silence, and suddenly all these family secrets were spilled out. Not the part about my grandfather, nor about what happened to Augustus. But now the things that my parents did to my sisters and me have been dug up from the dark pit in which they’ve been buried and they are making national headlines.

At first, this news distressed me. All these secrets that we tried to protect for so many years now became common knowledge. All the things that I thought were so normal have horrified the general public. I was inconsolable.

But all was not lost. Because now I was not just the crazy girl who murdered everyone on the train. I became the girl driven mad by terrible circumstances, and suddenly the public has become sympathetic to me. I will never be forgiven for the things that I supposedly did on the train, but now people are asking that I be spared.

Will I be? I don’t know.


	47. Chapter 47

**_District 3_ **

My grandmother lives in District 3 with her Peacekeeper husband. He is old now, too, so there is very little he does aside from sit at a desk and order people around.

I am serving my sentence here. I live with Grandma and Grandpa, but during the day I go to the local hospital for care. It’s not bad, besides being dry and hot. Grandpa laughs at me and says that it’ll only get drier and hotter as the summer comes along.

They’ve given me ten years out here for the murder of nine people. I’ll still have to do my duties as victor when the Hunger Games roll around, and I’ll still need to answer the Capitol whenever the call on me. I’m restricted where I can go, and I’m not allowed to leave town without permission. They monitor me closely, and I’m not going to do anything to piss them off. Not when they’ve been so lenient with me. They could have locked me away forever or killed me for my “crimes”, but Grandma says that it would have not benefited them. She says that already they’re rewriting history to make me appear more endearing, more of a victim, more of a girl gone mad who wanted to enjoy her Victory Tour so much but was haunted by the things her parents did to her. The families of the deceased staff members are angry, of course, but they’re being placated with lies. Everyone is. Lie after lie after lie.

That’s all my life is, isn’t it?

Grandma says no. I’m not convinced.

But I am here, and I no longer have the heaviness of the Capitol looming over my head, and in some ways, this is more freedom that I have ever had in my life, even if I’m required to go to the hospital seven days a week for outpatient care. My sisters must stay in the Capitol to keep up appearances, but soon enough it will be time for the Hunger Games again, and I will be back with them.

Grandma gave me a fresh notebook, and the two of us thought of an actual code. Slowly I am starting to transpose my “writing” here into the new notebook using the new code. Using real words. Grandma says that people need to know my story, even if it’s nothing that will ever be read in the present. I am writing it for future generations. For history. For a world long in the future that will be different from the Panem we know now. She said that someday soon, she will tell me her own story.

**_The End_ **


	48. Thank You & Notes

Thank you to everyone who read this. Props to you for getting through it. Many thanks especially to those who commented: Brook1, darth_nell, Jannkat, spark_phoenix, Unicorn7.

This wasn’t the easiest story to write. As you may (or may not) know, I tend to “wing” the things that I write, and it normally goes over well. But this was something else entirely. I quickly realized how outright _boring_ the Victory Tour was. Just the same thing over and over and over. And over. And I also had so many damned characters to keep track of that I had trouble actually making them characters. I think that “Avalon’s” writing style actually worked well with this part, though. I know people marvel at the fact that I write so quickly, but let me say that telling a story like this wasn’t made for someone who must write fast or else loses interest.

The only thing I can say is that this is more akin to a first draft than an actual novel. I really struggled with this but pushed through it before I got sidetracked with something newer and shinier, and I’m not entirely disappointed with it, but it wasn’t one of my best pieces. There were a great many things not fully addressed because it came from the perspective of Avalon, and she could not possibly have known the behind the scenes of many things. I also recognize that there might be some “jumps” between events, especially at the end, that may not have been explained the best.

I am grateful that I am done writing this story because it wasn’t always the most fun and I had to push myself to continue on with it, but I don’t hate it and I hope that someday I’ll come back to it and revise it. With that in mind, I’m okay with any constructive criticism people might have. I’ll also answer questions if there’s anything people find confusing. I do still plan on having this be “canonical” for my series.

So here’s advice to anyone writing the Victory Tour:

  * Don’t wing it. Have a plan. Otherwise every stop is boring. Find some subplots.
  * Killing a character might be Problem Solving 101, but killing nine characters only makes your writer’s block worse because then you have to dig yourself out of the hole you created.
  * Avoid having a trillion characters on the train.
  * The more characters you kill and thus have the replace, the more names you have to come up with.



Suggestions for next story? I obviously have the CYOA still open, so I have to get on that again. And I’ve already started brainstorming things for Elijah during the 136th (the year his tribute James won). I can’t go past 147th until the CYOA finishes, but there’s plenty to do in the meantime.


	49. Character List

Victors (mentioned in this story)

146 – Avalon Vitner – District 1  
145 – Cassiopeia – District 5  
144 – Sapphire – District 2  
143 – Isabella Vitner – District 1  
142 – Europa Vitner – District 1  
140 – Juniper Sadik – District 7  
139 – Rikuto Cord – District 6  
138 – Esther Hugh – District 8  
136 – James – District 5  
135 – Isolde Lee – District 1  
134 – Hammer Williams – District 1  
133 – Elijah Asher – District 5  
131 – Lady McClure – District 10  
130 – Elm Cottonwood – District 7  
129 – Terra Woods – District 12  
128 – Butch Granite – District 2  
127 – Bran Grist – District 9  
126 – Zinc – District 3  
125 – Pitch Yassen – District 7  
123 – Colton Farms – District 10  
122 – Jericho – District 1  
121 – Freya – District 2  
120 – Vesa – District 7  
118 – Ferrer Miltiades – District 2  
115 – Cronus – District 1  
114 – Solar Graham – District 5  
113 – Falcon – District 6  
112 – Calico Smithers – District 8  
111 – Vulcan Plume – District 2  
110 – Gamma – District 3  
109 – Joule Leonard – District 3  
108 – Luna – District 1  
106 – Savera – District 6  
105 – Bristlecone – District 7  
104 – Alexis – District 2  
102 – Phoenix – District 12  
101 – Belle – District 10  
96 – Dallas – District 10  
83 – Dawn Hildebrand – District 1  
80 – Liberty – District 7  
79 – Benjamin Dalton – District 5

On the Train

Mildred – escort  
Gerald – escort  
Empress – escort  
Blue-Anna – stylist  
Kleo – stylist  
Sweetheart – stylist  
Cynthia – prep team member  
Bobby – prep team member  
Flamingo – prep team member  
Carat – prep team member  
Spike – prep team member  
Flurry / Dr. Fluorine / Dr. Larunda – prep team member / researcher  
Dr. Newell – doctor / researcher  
Timothy – peacekeeper in séance  
Spud – crewman in séance  
  



End file.
